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Face it - whether we like it or not, new game sequels are coming out this year. Given this revelation, I decided to sit down and come up with the top 10 sequels I don't want to see by year's end. Keep in mind that I only vaguely looked up what games are coming out this year, and this is more of a whine list than anything.
Here is my list of games that I would like to see in 2010.
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Joystiq is floating around a rumor that Tecmo Super Bowl (SNES version) is coming to XBLA/PSN in the future. Although this strikes me as mediocre news at best, there is one shining glimmer of hope nestled within - that the updated game (Tecmo Bowl Throwback) will retain the players and teams from the original game.
In other words, you can play as the 49ers and crush everyone. Yes please. no comments
Yep, it's GTA.
Ok, that sounds bad, but it's really not. Altough Chinatown doesn't push the GTA franchise to any new or exciting heights (GTA4 pretty much put a lid on that), it does pack a lot of juice into a small box. There is a whole new collection of mini games, such as the educational drug dealing sessions that teach you everything you need to know about weed, meth, coke, and all those other things my D.A.R.E. teacher told me about. You can give tattoos for some cash, play scratch-off lottery tickets, and they've even made the GT part of the GTA harder by adding a hotwire minigame to car stealing. All that, and I'm only about two hours in.
As for the gameplay, it's solid but clunky at times, specifically when you are on foot, which is exacerbated by the presence of mutliple surrounding enemies. The target lock-on mechanic helps smooth things over, but sometimes the characters are just too small and fast, and the PSP's analog nub continues its mission of making life more difficult than it should be.
The player's PDA/Smartphone plays a large role in Chinatown Wars, as it hold all of the pertinent people, place, and thing to do info. Most importantly, though, it delivers your emails to you, so you no longer have to go find a computer. One of the more convenient aspects of the game is when you receive an email (usually informing you of someone that either wants to buy or sell some drugs at a good price), it gives you the option of setting your GPS to their location just by pressing X while reading the message. This takes all the guesswork and frustrating searches out of the equation, and really streamlines the game.
The driving is somewhat difficult to deal with, mainly because the cars move pretty fast, and you can't see very far ahead of yourself. This makes it very easy to accidentally slam into a police car and start that whole mess of a process, especially when you are mid-mish. Luckily, there is an included "Trip Skip" feature that lets you cut out the driving portion of missions on which you die over and over, taking at least a small part of the frustration out of having to replay them.
After spending time with Chinatown Wars, I feel that the GTA franchise may be better suited moving forward on handelds as opposed to consoles, especially since much of the content can be gracefully sized down to accomodate a DS or PSP without losing much of the intended fun. GTA on consoles plateaued with GTA4, but Chinatown Wars proves that there is still a big world explore in the palm of your hand. no comments
Face it - whether we like it or not, new game sequels are coming out this year. Given this revelation, I decided to sit down and come up with the top 10 sequels I'd like to see by year's end. Keep in mind that I only vaguely looked up what games are coming out this year, and this is more of a wishlist than anything.
Here is my list of sequels I DON"T want to see in 2010.
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After getting over my initial disappointment at this game not being a Noah's Arc Sim, I jumped in to the online demo for Army of Two: The 40th Day with some level of excitement. While the first release in what I can only expect to be the gripping saga of Salem and Rios was pretty ho-hum, I liked the fact that it focused on co-operative play. I mean, in what other game can you find a button reserved solely for post-firefight fist bumps?
Unfortunately in this post-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 world that we live in, the good intentions of the folks at EA Montreal just don't replace the absolutely sluggish controls. I hate to say that this one thing can ruin what might be an otherwise standard co-op shooter, but it really does boil down to that.
If you are part of the 90% of gamers out there who have played COD, Assassin's Creed, Fallout 3 or any of the Uncharted games, then you know what responsive gameplay is. And if you know what it is to play with relatively good accurate controls are it is very hard to spend much time with Army of Two.
Aside from the laggy control, things like the plot, graphics and "acting" of this sequel are decent. The co-op elements have been juiced a little-- you now have the ability to make snap-decisions mid-game which will decide episode outcome. For instance, in the demo you are initially trained by a fellow mercenary for most of the trial. By the end you recieve a message over your headset to either kill this nice guy who just offered to buy a round after the mission, or put one in his ear for some extra dough. The cool thing is that the first player to hit the "yes" or "no" button is the decider, Player 2 just has to go along with it. It all carries out in cutscenes, but it's cool tweak to throw between to poeple playing online.
Should you check out this demo? For sure, it can't hurt to give it a play, but I would say your time would be better spent replaying Uncharted 2 than with this one, folks.
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We're launching The Easy Mode! To celebrate this momentous occasion (and to hook a few new readers) we're giving away this Valve swag bag of games, clothing and fine home furnishing to one lucky follower.
- Copy of Left 4 Dead 2 for Xbox 360
- Left 4 Dead t-shirt (Med.)
- Left 4 Dead mousepad (regulation size)
- Five Left 4 Dead 2 mini-posters for each campaign
- Four Saxton Hale (of Mann Co.) mini-comic covers
- Official Prima Left 4 Dead strategy guide
- One French Kiss from Russ (must pick-up in person)
More pictures after the break.
