G l i t c h y G o b l i n !

I’ve crawled back from the jungle to bring you this week’s review of Uncharted 2: Among Thieves.  The PS3 exclusive Uncharted series is a step-up in the third-person adventure style that Tomb Raider started.  The first game evolved the genre so much, ripe with great storytelling and phenomenal platforming control, that it’s unfortunate in some ways the sequel takes a step back.

PROS:

It’s still great storytelling. I believe the story is even better this time.  There’s still superb voice acting and great, lovable characters.  Nathan Drake is still hilarious.

It looks stunning. The game was released toward the end of last year, and it is only second best behind the recent God of War III in terms of graphics.  The detail in the environments is staggering to say the least.

The train sequence is epic. Stretching across a couple of chapters, the sequence on the train is probably one of my favorite levels among the plethora of games that I’ve played in my life.  The environment whizzing by and gradually changing just adds to it.

Finally, the final boss is finally fun, finally. It’s no telling how long it has been since I’ve been impressed with a final boss fight.  Most games are either cliché, boring, out-of-place, or non-existent in the department of having a final boss fight.  The fight feels frantic and fast-paced even though you’re basically doing the same thing over and over.

If you liked the first one, you’ll probably want to buy this one as well. It’s worth the money if you like the series.  With the added multiplayer, you’ll play this one more than the first.

CONS:

I died way too much. OK, I put the game on easy so that I could kick back and enjoy the story without the hassle of trying too hard.  Instead I still died constantly from grenades landing perfectly on my shoulder, enemies spawning behind me, snipers one-hit killing me, and the controls throwing me off ledges when I didn’t want to do any such thing.  It really put me in a bad mood for the next couple of days.

In addition to the above, some gunfights were way too long. It was on easy, so there shouldn’t have been more and more enemies constantly streaming in for 10-20 minutes in some places.  This really threw off the flow of the action.

The level design doesn’t flow as well. Both games have excellent level design, but unlike the first game this one had me constantly wondering where to go next.  Sometimes I would have to wait for a hint because I would search the place and still not be able to progress.  I loved how in the first game I would automatically survey my surroundings and say to myself, “Ah, I could climb up over there.”  Not in this one.

The beginning of the game has you stealthin’ about. Why must games include stealth missions?  Even though this one wasn’t too hard, it still wasn’t a very good way to start out a game.  I guess it did make me learn hand-to-hand combat, a feature I barely used in the first game.

The multiplayer isn’t anything to write home about. It’s basically a Gears of War rip-off with the match recording system of Halo 3.  Gears of War plays better and Halo 3 has more options of the recording.  Anyway, it sports basic deathmatch, capture the flag, and other types.  It ranks you up as you do more stuff, as the trend is with today’s multiplayer games.

Anyway, I was hoping for a better experience than what I received, especially when it was IGN’s Game of the Year 2009.  Assassin’s Creed II still wins in my book.  Next week I’ll have a No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle review.

I’m back again, and this time with great vengeance.  Epic vengeance.  Glorious vengeance.  Finally, the day has arrived for the epic conclusion in the God of War series, God of War III.  If you haven’t played this series before, read the God of War Collection review and buy that game and then this one.  If you think it’s bad, shut up and continue playing anyway.  If you finish this spectacular conclusion and still don’t like it, go to an exposed corner of a brick wall and shove your face into it over and over.  I couldn’t care less what you think.  For those of us who deserve to live:  Play this game.  Now.  It doesn’t matter what else you’re playing; it can wait.

PROS:

Teh GRAFICKS. The best implementation of computerized video technology so far in the known video game world is in this game.  There are only 4 loading screens:  the one before the opening cinematic, the one you get if you die and have to restart at the last checkpoint (duh, the game wasn’t expecting you to FAIL AT BEING EPIC), one in a hallway toward the end, and one if you load your game.  But you won’t have that one because I expect you to play it through without stopping or blinking.

You kill things. Lots of things.  And if you have been following along in the story then when you kill these people it will be the most satisfying thing ever.

Switch weapons on the fly! L1 + X equals go to the next weapon and continue the brutality you are currently dishing out.

It clears up things that I had a problem with, mythology-wise.  They explain a lot of things that I was previously confused about.  You know that thing you said, “Well, that’s stupid and anticlimactic” about in the first game?  Explained.  The plot also refers back to many things Kratos did or plot points that were created back in the first two games.  It’s a smorgasbord of God of War trivia.

Like the first two in the series, it has lots of documentaries. The main making-of video shows a lot of the 2 and a half process of making the game.  Stan Lee makes an appearance!

CONS:

Some players might not like the ending. If you happen to be a fan of bad storytelling, or hate good things in general, then you will probably not like the ending.  Go find a cliff and throw your mother off of it.  Then, after you watch her death, jump over as well and try to hit her corpse for extra points.  The ending is poetic and makes sense in every sense of the word.

Challenge of Olympus seems easier. The extra mode that has been featured in every game (Challenge of ____) is in this one as well.  I beat 6 of the 7 challenges without too much retrying in about 30 minutes.  There is a Combat Arena, but it is unlocked after you beat all 7.  I don’t know what’s in that (maybe more, harder challenges, lol), but the game’s only been out for 5 days.

On one boss I died a lot. It’s a massive series of checkpoints.  At almost every point I died because I wasn’t quick enough or didn’t know what to do.  It’s ok, because when you go through that section on a second playthrough you’ll get every one of them and it’s amazing.

There’s no spear-a-majig. That awesome lance weapon from the second game.  I wish it was in this one.  Oh, well.

My main only real problem is: At one point I glitched this game so hard that I hard to start back like 2 hours previous in the game.  If Goblin had been watching he would’ve been proud of me.  Always keep more than one save of your game, in case you hit the same glitch I did.  If after a boss’s death cutscene you are at a previous (like 10 minutes ago) area’s portal and then after you go through that portal it takes you to a different area, don’t save.  After the boss’s death you were supposed to be dropped into a hallway.  I can’t find anyone online who has experienced the same glitch.  Without giving any spoilers, it would be the cutscene that triggers after you let go of L2 and R2 at the same time, about 5 or 6 hours in.

Well, the gist is that you should play this on a 1080i HDTV with really loud sound, in the dark and in one sitting.  Then cry out of either happiness or because you’re currently mutilating your face against a brick wall.  In the end, there will only be chaos…

You know when I said that Boba playing Legend of Zelda music on an accordion would be the biggest nerdgasm you would ever have? Yea, well, looks like I was wrong. JimmyJane, a company that creates sex toys, has created a clit vibe called the Form 2 that looks curiously like the Millennium Falcon. They claim that this wasn’t actually their intention, but they’re running with it and have even created a comparison chart of the two:

I have a very bad feeling about this. We nerds are an addictive people. We’re complete-ists who will spend hundreds of dollars on toys and collectibles just to say that we have more than somebody else. Shit, some of us will even buy the same action figure over and over again just because the packaging has changed. Who’s to say that we nerds won’t go overboard when it comes to infusing our sex lives with nerdery? I’m afraid it could spiral out of control like with the Twilighters. They started out as harmless tweens with a vampire fetish, and then BOOM! They’ve got the Vamp dildos, which snowballed into the manllows, and who knows what kind of weird shit will be out by the time the Breaking Dawn movie is released. Are vampire teeth nipple clamps next?

For us, it could start with the Form 2/ Falcon vibe. Then pretty soon, we’re sticking a vacuum cleaner hose through the mouth hole of our Greedo Halloween masks so we can pretend we’re getting ours necks suckled (or other areas) by a dirty alien mercenary while we wedge Hasbro lightsabers up our asses, clamp our stormtrooper and ewok Pez dispensers onto our nipples, and finally choke ourselves with a video game controller chord while we snort coke off a cardboard standee.

I’m just saying that it can only get weirder from here. So… are you gonna buy one?

For the first time, this week’s review is of more than one game!  God of War Collection is Sony’s way of getting everyone hyped for today’s (March 16, 2010) release of God of War III.  I’ll have that review completed next week.  God of War Collection is a port of the first two games of the series, originally only on the PS2.  Now they have been re-mastered in High Definition to base all three games on one system.

PROS:

Hopefully this is a trend. Having the first two games on a current system is something that hopefully Sony and other companies start doing more often.  I fully expect Sony to reveal at E3 2010 that a Team ICO Collection of ICO and Shadow of the Colossus will be released shortly before the third game, The Last Guardian.  The convenience of not having to dust off your PS2 is awesome, and that’s all most people have, as most PS3s do not have backwards compatibility.

It has some visual upgrades. It wasn’t recoded to be in true HD, but the scaling does improve both games quite a bit, more so in the second one than the first.  The frame-rate is now at a perfect 60fps (frames per second), and there is none of the screen tearing that was pretty noticeable in both games on the PS2.  The frame-rate actually does make a noticeable difference in the fluidity of the combat.

It’s worth the money. If you love the God of War series, then to have both 1 and 2 re-mastered in HD on a current platform is definitely worth the budget price of $40.  Both games are about 10 hours the first times through, and there are hours of documentary videos for both games.

There are two sets of trophies, a set for each game.  I’m not a trophy whore (achievements ftw), but most of them on both are easy to collect.  This is double the fun for a gamer, especially if the player hasn’t played either game before.

If you are new to these and happen to love them, then you’ll get a lot of re-playability out of these games.  I’ve personally played God of War 6 times and God of War II 4 times now, with a count added to each because of Collection.  It’s only just now starting to get old to me.

CONS:

No Chains of Olympus. If would’ve taken a lot of work to put the PSP’s God of War:  Chains of Olympus onto the PS3, but it would’ve been the cherry on the God of War Collection sundae.

No extra content. There are a lot of documentary videos, but they’re what came with the games originally.

Cutscenes and documentaries are not in HD. In-game cutscenes look pretty muddy, and the documentaries are less than DVD quality or less.  The Collection is meant to be played on a large HDTV, and these videos don’t stand the test of time.

And speaking of standing the test of time: even with its slight upgrade to HD, the first game doesn’t look near as good as it did when you first played it on the PS2. Or if you’re playing it for the first time, it’ll look pretty old.

Widescreen stretches the HUD. For those that know me, one of my worst pet peeves is incorrect aspect ratios.  It bothers me to no end.  The sides of the gameplay’s view are just extended to show more on the screen at once, but the HUD (heads-up display) is instead stretched wider.  All circular things are now ovals, and so on.  It personally gets to me.

There you have it.  If you know what’s good for you, you’ll get this and God of War III, play them all through in one continuous sitting, and then die happy while shouting, “Ares!”

Talking to Fangirls:

Being a fangirl in a fanboy’s world, I have experienced a lot of, well, unfortunate and embarrassing displays of “admiration.” I get it. I’m a rarity. Not a lot of chicks walk into the comic book store or make obscure references to Batman villains at work. But some fanboys act like they have never, ever been in contact with a woman before, and this concerns me because they make some of the dumbest fucking assumptions about me, and what I may know and care about.

I’m gonna help you guys out. Here is how not to talk to a fangirl, so you won’t verbally faceplant like these guys did.

Rule #1: Don’t assume that because you have the penis, that you are a bigger fan than me.

This is the quickest way to piss me the fuck off. It’s openly sexist. You are trying to impress me with news that happened months ago, because I, a girl, obviously would not be keeping up with the comings and goings of my own obsession. What the fuck? I get that if you had just met someone, you might throw out a few facts to see how they react, to see if they are as up to speed as you, but don’t insult their intelligence.

The biggest incident concerning this happened just a few months ago. My comic book store in Knoxville was closing (Triad Comics, R.I.P.), and this dude was trying to impress me with his Star Wars knowledge. Death Troopers had come out the day before, and he had the fucking nerve to ask me if I had heard of it. Yea, fucker, I had, like way fucking back in February 2009, when it had been announced. It was a fucking Star Wars novel combining zombies with Han and Chewie on a prison barge, how could I let that kind of holy geekery slip past me! It was all any nerd could talk about that week! I would have had to have been deaf and blind not to have at least heard of it, and there I was, holding my stack of Star Wars comics and a Tag & Bink trade paperback, and he still assumed I was a casual fan! So fuck you! Fuck you for assuming I didn’t know my shit, and for still going on and on about it even after I told you, “Yes, I know what it is,” and even explaining that I hadn’t bought it yet because I didn’t have the money for a hardback! You still had to go on like I didn’t know what it was about, like I was just yes-ing you or buying it just because it said “Star Wars” on the cover! FUCK YOU!!!

Rule #2: Don’t try to be a pimp. We’re too smart for that.

Before Triad opened, I had to go to this creepy comic book store called, we’ll say, “Collector’s Hell”. At the time, the owner, who we will call “Silent Bob,” had this guy working there who was kind of like “Jay” because he thought he was a smooth pimp, who loved the pussy, and Tubby there, was his fat man servant. For those of you who don’t get the reference, that was a line from Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back. Anyway, “Jay” was the kind of nerd who thought he was a fucking pimp, and he loved it when my nerdy, underage self would come in. He was pathetic, and would try to impress me with stuff even a sheltered, 16-year-old knew was bullshit. I always wondered if he would ever realize how gross and sad he was, a thirty-something year old man, hitting on a teenager, always asking me when I was going to turn eighteen. Then years later, after “Jay” had left the store, I asked “Silent Bob” if he needed any help in the summer, since I felt relatively safe around a man who only ever said “Hello,” and “Here’s your change.” He said “Yea, I can think of a few positions that you would be good at,” in a tone that told me he wasn’t talking about filing the back issues or organizing the posters. I never went back. Epic fail, guys.

What is it that Jay’s shoulder angel said in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back when he was gonna pull his dick out to impress Justice? Oh, yea. “That’s it, boy, put the dick down. You gotta go from the heart, yo. No little perv bullshit’s gonna work for this one.”

Exactly.

Rule #3: Don’t tell me you’ve met celebrities known for never doing the convention circuit. I know you are full of shit.

“Jay” once told me he met Harrison Ford at a Star Wars convention in Nashville. Bitch, please. Do I even have to explain to any of you how far-fetched that is? Probably not.

About six months ago, one of my fangirl friends and I went into Triad, and I suppose we left ourselves open to conversation because we bust in there ranting about how there’s hyperspace travel, air speeders, and other complex technologies in the Star Wars prequels, but evidently no effective birth control. There was no doubt that we were Star Wars fangirls. So this 50-year-old man starts macking on us, telling us about his $10,000 Star Wars collection and how he met Ewan McGregor at Celebration II. Obviously he didn’t know who he was messing with. 1) I was at that convention. The closest Ewan McGregor got to it was a video he and George were in that played during the opening ceremony where they thanked everyone for coming. They were a safe distance of 2,000 miles away. 2) If Ewan had been at CII, I would have sensed it through the Force. My vagina would have started to emit a sonar-like pulse and immediately started honing in on his location. Once his position was confirmed, my pussy would have sent his coordinates to the GPS trackers in my nipples, which would have locked onto his location. I like to imagine my nipples emitting a “Boop, boop, boop” noise during all of this. God help the volunteer 501^st trooper who would have stood in the way of my horny, 16-year-old self. 3) Ewan McGregor has never been to any convention, you fucking asshole.

Rule #4: Just be yourself.

Don’t put on airs to talk to us. We won’t do it for you. You’re much more attractive when we’re not having to wade through a sea of bullshit to find about if you are worth our time or not.

Whew. That wore me out. Let me know what you think at fangirlontheloose@gmail.com or on my blog. MTFBWY.

Yo! I’m back this week to brave the ocean city of Rapture again in Bioshock 2.  As with the first game, the sequel is a FPS that plays more like an adventure game than anything else.  The premise is that a man named Andrew Ryan, tired of governments and social norms, built Rapture to create a society where anyone can do what they want.  Gene splicing was heavily researched and all citizens wanted to look and feel better by using Plasmids (magic like lightning, fire, etc.) and gene tonics, which actually alter your genes to make you different.  Anyone who hasn’t played the first one should… now.  Glitchy Goblin himself is actually playing it beside me while I watch it.

PROS:

It’s good to be back. Even though the sequel is made by a different studio, an aspect that had everyone wary about the idea, they managed to capture the feeling of the unique underwater environments of the first game.  There are actual in-the-water underwater sections added to the mix, and with this it allows you to explore sections of Rapture that were out of reach the first time around.  Also, I recommend playing Bioshock 2 as it was meant to be played:  on the hardest difficulty setting.  It isn’t overly difficult, even though you’ll feel underpowered at the beginning, Vita-chambers respawn you infinitely if you die, and you’ll appreciate the strategy it takes a whole lot more.  Believe me.

The maturity is back. The mature story, ripe with controversial topics and vulgarity, makes a return as well.  Some citizens are sadistic (as told through their audio diaries), and some sections still have that horror-esque “you’re not safe here” ambience to them.  You once walk into a room with 3 baby cribs and about 15 televisions hovering above the cribs as play subliminal messages on them.

As with every other sequel I’ve reviewed, there are many improvements.  There are more weapons, plasmids, and enemy types.  Each plasmid now actually “evolves” when you upgrade it.  Like you can start out with Lightning, but eventually you’ll have a Lightning Storm.  This is greatly improved, since in the first game they only got stronger or had a longer duration as you upgraded them.  The new hacking minigame is also much shorter and therefore less annoying.

There is an ending. Bioshock had one of the worst endings I’ve ever seen.  It was basically a screenshot that depended on whether you were good or bad during the game, and it took it to an extreme.  Apparently, if you kill little girls than you would eventually like to rule the entire world through its destruction.  Plus, immediately before that, there was a sucky final boss.  This has none of these, and it makes sense.

It has a pretty entertaining multiplayer. For a sense of the multiplayer, go read my Modern Warfare 2 review.  They basically copied it, except it doesn’t take near as long to complete.  The more XP you get, the more stuff you unlock, and it also has challenges to complete.  Excuse me, I meant “trials”.  It doesn’t feel tacked on, and they try to give it a story.  It makes it a kind of prequel to everything.  The gameplay does not feel like Modern Warfare 2 at all, though.  It feels like Team Fortress 2.

CONS:

There are occasional glitches. Sometimes my hacked security bots would get stuck in midair or something similar.  These are frequent happenings, just minor annoyances.

Sometimes you don’t feel like you’re playing a Big Daddy. This is mostly toward the underpowered beginning, but when Splicers can hit me with a wrench and take out a quarter of my health… I just don’t remember ever being able to melee a Big Daddy four times and kill it, you know?

Your drill has fuel. As a Big Daddy, you have a drill arm.  I don’t ever see other Big Daddies have to refuel, so why should I?

OK, so right now Goblin is trying to tick me off by meleeing everything while spouting puns and making Chewbacca noises.  Back to the review.

It’s shorter than the first game. Bioshock 1 was pretty lengthy for an FPS. This one is not quite as long, but it’s close to the same length.  I actually spent more time playing this one because I explored more and was more careful.

It still has open areas, but it’s more linear in a way. Unlike the first game, once you leave an area you cannot revisit it.  They do warn you of this, however, so don’t worry that it suddenly takes you to another place against your will.  The areas themselves still feel open ended like in the first game.

Well, Goblin has many more cons, but who listens to that guy?  I’ve been Vegieza, and remember:  every word I speak, you already know.

Bah. I listen to me, and I’m all that matters. That being said, Bioshock is awesome, and a big thank you to Vegieza both for letting me play the game and for the sweet review. Sorry it’s late, yall.