Tag Archives: 4

The Hits and Misses of 2012: Part 3 of 4

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Howdy everyone Jessica Valentine here, today I am going to round up the good, the bad, and the most surprising video games of this year. In other words YAY! BOO… and Oh Cool. Lets start with the BOO… shall we? I would hate to leave it for last best we get it out of the way.

And here we go… My biggest disappointment for gaming this year cannot be attributed to just one game, but the delays that pushed back the releases of a few games that I anxiously awaited. *Cough* BioShock Infinite*Cough*Luigi’s Mansion 2*Cough*. Sorry about that I must be sick. Sick of WAITING! Moving on and regaining my composure, I should mention that this year I have been let down by many a game, but one game immediately springs to mind when I think of the word disappointment. I had such high hopes for this game, only to be let down. So, the award for Jessica’s Biggest Disappointment of 2012 goes to… Drum-roll please…The Secret World.

Meh.

Meh.

Dear The Secret World, you broke my heart. I wanted to love you, I really did, your concept, your art, your ideas were fantastic. I thought you would be the one to rope me into MMO’s Then I took you home… For those of you not familiar with The Secret World it is a MMO set in the real world, but with just one difference. Every conspiracy theory  or myth turns out to be true. Cool, right? Players are given a choice of 3 factions, the Illuminati, the Templars or the  Dragon. Personally I chose the Illuminati because hey with a faction tagline of “Sex, Drugs, and Rockefeller” Why the !@#$ would I pick anything else? And that’s where I stopped having fun.

Maybe it’s just me, but I cannot get used WASD controls. A PC gamer I am not, because if I was at least I wouldn’t spend 20 minutes running into walls or get lost trying to find my objective. Also for some reason the game decided that it couldn’t recognize my graphics card and although I have a pretty beefy card in my laptop, the game always defaulted to a low graphics setting, where I couldn’t read anything. Despite my floundering with the controls and necessary tweaking of the settings I bravely pressed on. Then it was boring. I don’t know why, but the story did not engage me. I found myself not caring if my character lived or died. The game was just boring. Needless to say I didn’t play it very long. Maybe if I had toughed it out I would have liked it more, but there is nothing worse then realizing that you just spent good money on something that is just not worth your time. I realize that now the game is free to play, which is should have been to begin with. Desperate times call for desperate measures I suppose.

Now let me lighten the mood a little bit. “Damn Jessica, you scary when you go on rants.” “Why thank you, Jessica.I take that as a compliment.” Yes I am talking to myself and no I don’t care that you are judging me right now. Any who, incoherent segues aside, my most surprising game of 2012 is Borderlands 2. Before I am assaulted with a resounding “WHAT?!”, let me explain. I normally do not play first-person shooters because of this, Borderlands (the original game) somehow flew under my usually impressive radar. So on a whim, I purchased Borderlands 2 knowing nothing of the game other than it was a cell shaded first-person shooter. Boy howdy was I  delighted with my “whim” of a purchase.

Only downside? Claptrap, shut your trap!

Only downside? Claptrap, shut your trap!

Not only is Borderlands 2 fun, the story engaging, and is just overall awesome but it managed to accomplish something that no other video game had done before. It got me to actually buy DLC for it. I have wanted to buy DLC for many games but this was the first game that I actually purchased DLC for. I just had to have the Mechromancer pack. There is nothing not cool about running around with a !@#$% giant robot named Deathtrap that just straight murders practically everything in his path. I LOVE IT. If you don’t have it get it. Like seriously. So yes, that sums up my most surprising game of the year.

Now ladies and gents for the highlight of this post the highest honor I can give to a game my pick for best game of 2012.  And that the most exemplary game is Dance Central 3 for the Xbox 360. I do love me some movin’ and groovin’. Okay I you got me. I lied. I never have and most likely never will EVER play Dance Central 3 and no, I have not played the first two games of the series. Now I will tell you my actual pick for best game of 2012, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. Yes, I know that came out in 2011, it’s because I am messing with you again. For realsies this time, my pick for best of 2012 is Persona 4: Golden on the PS Vita.

Golden for a reason.

Golden for a reason.

I love the Persona franchise and no joke this game is the reason why I bought a PS Vita. ‘Nuff Said.

-Jessica OUT *throws down microphone*

13 Scares of Halloween – Day 8: Left 4 Dead

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What’s good, everyone? It’s Joshua Evo again and welcome to Day 8 of our video game scares. I actually don’t have too much to say about this particular one, simply because of the fact that I’m pretty sure that EVERYONE in the modern gaming world has seen it or had it happen to them. I am of course, talking about the attack of the Witch.

I’m getting to it, bear with me…

I’m of course referring to the the Witch, the mad-woman infected from the feel-good, family party adventure, Left 4 Dead. This is gonna be short and sweet; in Left 4 Dead, there are the normal kinds of zombies (the Horde) and the special Zombies. All of them have special little gimmicks and powers but one of them is arguably the most feared of all. You’ll rarely see the Witch immediately but you’ll definitely get a chilling feeling, probably brought on by the REALLY creepy sound of someone crying. Against most people’s better judgment, they go try to investigate the source of the crying. Only to run into this:

Yeaaaahhh… That picture up there doesn’t seem so silly NOW, now does it? OK, it’s still a little funny.

– Evo out

Review – Persona 4 Arena

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Hey everyone, James B. Boss here with my latest game review. I know it has been awhile since I have done one, but let’s put that aside for now and get to my review. This time, my review is about the game Persona 4 arena, which is the latest entry in the popular JRPG (Japanese Role Playing Game) series. Usually, entries in this series are played in a traditional RPG-style of gameplay but this time, it is presented in the form of a fighting game.

Review was done on the PS3 version.





PRESENTATION: 4/5

Persona 4 Arena takes place two months after the events of the previous game and is a direct sequel in a way, so once again, the protagonist Yu Narukami and his friends have to jump into action. As you play through the game, you will experience some of it’s great features, such as a great soundtrack with remixed songs from the last game, anime-style graphics and new and old characters to use in battle. Though this game is technically a sequel to Persona 4, it is graced with the appearances of three characters from Persona 3. You can also change the language spoken in the game from English to Japanese, so if you are a hardcore fan and you like the original voices, then you don’t have to worry. Also, the story mode in this game follows the paths of each of the characters and is told in the style of a visual novel, with the inclusion of cutscenes.

 

GAMEPLAY: 4/5

Persona 4 Arena’s gameplay is unique in it’s own way, but as you dive deeper into its mechanics, you’ll find that it is very similar to Blazblue. You have four buttons to use for attacking. Two of them are used basic attacks, while the other two, are used to summon your persona. When it comes to combos, the game mainly points you in the direction of using persona in mid combo, to deal an enormous amount of damage. Some of the Persona 4 Arena’s basic actions contain, super jumping, guard canceling, super canceling and bursting. These skills can be used to give yourself an edge in your fight, so learn to use them to their fullest extent. If find that you may have trouble learning a characters moves, then the game’s challenge mode will be able to help understand the characters combo timing with ease and a lot of hard work. Considering that the source material would probably appeal to not only to fighting game fans but also fans of the Persona series who may not have as finely developed technical skills as fans who primarily play fighting games, combos have an “Easy” mode built-in so that mashing the [A] or Light attack button will go into a full combo that ends in a super. The game also has an online multiplayer feature, that of course, allows you to play against others worldwide. Aksys/Arc System Works Games are also famous for having fantastic Netcode, so playing online is smooth as silk. You can also play multiplayer locally with a friend.

 

OVERALL: 4/5

In the end of it all, Persona 4 Arena is a decent addition to the series and to the fighting game genre. The fact that it decided to take step into the fighting game world from the rpg world, is indeed an unexpected turn of events, but it still did fairly well. People who have played Blazblue, will probably get used to the games mechanics in flash, seeing as how both share a similar play style. While it is not trying to be the next best fighting game in the world, it has the potential to leave its mark on the wall, with other memorable fighting game titles and fits into the Persona universe nicely.

FINAL SCORE: 13/15

 

- James B. Boss

Day 24 of 31 – Call of Duty 4 : Modern Warfare

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Greetings everyone and welcome to Day 24.

 


Ok cool, it’s time for an FPS review. So everyone and their mother by now should know what Call of Duty is and if you don’t, well then that’s ok. Call of Duty was an FPS that started out as a WWII themed type of game, but later on it evolved into this game known as Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. At first I was a little judgmental about this kind of change to the franchise because I was used to playing the game in the WW2 timeline, but once I started playing this game, I accepted it right off the bat. I loved the new features and the storyline. The guns that they included in this game were also a hoot and it was also awesome when they gave you the ability to customize your guns. While the storyline of this game was great and the characters were just plain awesome, Modern Warfare shined the most during the multiplayer mode, but then again, that’s how most FPS games are nowadays. Modern Warfare was indeed a great game and it was only just a start of something even greater. As for being able to play this masterpiece, you can just find this game at any store that sells video games. Now feel free to continue  the hate. :-)

– James B. Boss

 

Call of Duty. So, I don’t have a terrible lot to say about this game that hasn’t been said already. I was never much of an FPS player and even today, I’m still pretty garbage at them so I passed on a LOT of various CoD and BF games. Shortly after I got my PS3, I picked this game up just to give it a spin and I did end up really enjoying it. To me, it’s the strongest of the Modern Warfare trilogy in terms of single player Campaign because I really liked the more modern setting and felt that the WWII premise had gotten pretty stale. Multiplayer is always a major point for these games and MW delivered pretty well there too so for the most part, this was a really enjoyable game for me. As to whether I think the MW series is going downhill? Ehhh… moving on… Also, I apologize for the short entry but I’ve got a case of carpal tunnel and typing at length is becoming a chore. I’m not taking any questions as to whether it’s Diablo III related or not. 

- Evo out.

Day 4 of 31 – Fallout 3

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It’s Fallout FRIDAY!! Wooo! Yeah!

People of the Capital Wasteland, it is I Jessica Valentine, your ruler! Hear me and obey! No seriously obey me… Just kidding. Fallout 3 was the much anticipated sequel to guess what? Fallout 1 and 2 and the ever-so-slightly lesser known Fallout: Tactics. Personally I love this game, from Megaton to Tenpenny Tower to giant fire ants and deathclaws, this game makes me lose myself for hours at a time. I could ramble on for hours about the wacky and wild situations that I have gotten into during my journey through the Capital Wasteland, but I rather not bore you with the tales of a worn out adventurer.  Moving back to why I love this game ever-so-much, the soundtrack as well as the voice acting was spot on. Although the character models left something to be desired with their blank dead stares as they spoke.  Creepy…

Moving onward with the tour, that brings me tooo… uhh… brain fart.. umm… PERKS! Oh yes.. the perk system. After all what is a brief review of Fallout without discussing one’s favorite perks. If you ask me, perhaps the two perks that I simply would not go without are Bloody Mess, (C’mon would you expect any less) annnnnnd Mysterious Stranger, because who doesn’t want a badass appearing out of nowhere and straight murdering whatever is in front of you only to mysteriously vanish into thin air without a word. Here is an interesting bit of trivia that I discovered my very first time I played the game. Apparently if you use the Black Widow perk on Burke when you first meet him in Megaton later in the game he will send you love letters whist at the same time be taking out contracts to kill you with the Talon Company. (I like to think that he is gifting me with sorta nice armor every time he sends them) Alright now, I have rambled on for too long. well… Thanks for listening, chiiillldren! This is Jessica Valentine, and you’re reading diskreaderror.me. We’re Radio Free Wasteland, and we’re here… for you.

-Ninja Vanish!!-

Wow. OK, I have absolutely NO way to follow that heavy dose of epic. Like, in a literal sense. I mean, I played Fallout 3 for a grand total of MAYBE two days and I didn’t get all that much done other than going through and making ghost towns of small, inhabited townships, seeing how close I could get to a Super Mutant before I pissed him off and trying to see how many Nuka Colas I could drink in the span of a few minutes. Sadly, I didn’t get too much into the game for a few reasons (chief among them is the fact that I’m a terrible person). Part of the problem was that I approached it as a traditional FPS (having never played any of the other games in the series) so a lot of the things in the game were jarring to me (damn V.A.T.S.) and it just sorta caught me off guard. That was then though. Nowadays, I think I’m definitely considering giving it a re-run through for any and all of the reasons she listed above. Serious, I mean how do you argue with ANY of that?

*Spoiler: You can’t!* [DAMN RIGHT you can't... -Jess]

-Evo out