Artistic Differences

Left 4 Duty

Keeping in theme with my last post...

Alright, i know you're all excited about Call of Duty 5: World at War but...stop it! Seriously. it's not being made by the same guys that made Call of Duty 4; Infinity Ward. You know them, these are the guys that started the series with COD and COD2 and then COD3 was handed over to Treyarch who made a spectacularly mediocre game.
But it's the same problem as Guitar Hero, people just see "Call of Duty" and assume it's gonna be up to the same quality standards as the previous title. Well i can pretty much assure you it's not. And if you don't believe me, apparently Treyarch is planning on putting zombies in this one. Yeah, zombies are cool and all, but not when they're supposed to be in a realistic WWII shooter. Hello! Seriously!? But i don't know who to be more angry with, Treyarch or the geniuses at Activision who keep handing the reins of the series over to them. So yeah, even if i hadn't been planning to before, i'll definitely be skipping this COD installment.

effing zombies...sheesh...

The Name Game.

So the reviews for Guitar Hero: World Tour are out...and pretty much confirm what i've been saying...well to my friends, not on here: adding extra stuff/drum pads doesn't necessarily make a better game. But let me back up for a minute.
Many people made the decision to take Guitar Hero III (and also World Tour) over Rock Band based on the idea "Well i'm gonna stick with the original; Guitar Hero." Which makes perfect sense, except for one small problem, guitar hero III and IV are not, i repeat not, the original. The guys who actually made Guitar Hero and Guitar Hero II, Harmonix (also responsible for the sorely underappreciate FreQuency and Amplitude, think 1-man Rock Band using a standard controller...maybe that's too hard...just google 'em) moved on to make Rock Band. So the guys responsible for the acxtual GAME Guitar Hero are making Rock Band now, i.e. Rock Band is really the "original." So even though Neversoft has been playing the copy-what-you-did-and-add-some-bullet-points game, they still can't match the quality and experince in music games maintained by Harmonix.
I actually have a friend who went the Guitar Heor>Rock Band route who said to me one day: "I like the Rock Band game better, but i prefer the Guitar Hero guitar." And this is exactly the kind of attitude that is the problem, everyone would rather have what's familiar that what's genuinely better. Personally i prefer the more realistic look and feel of the Rock Band Stratocaster, but i can understand the "hey, it's still just a game" aesthetic of the Guitar Hero SG/Les Paul. What i can't understand is choosing to make such an investment based on such a relatively insignificant factor as having the "original" name or guitar. And i'm not even going to get into the HUGE discrepancy between RB's downloadable content and GH's.
Harmonix continues to impress with the continued quality of their work even without the recognition of the brand they built while never soft slowly falters with the quality of that brand. So wake up, people! This is the same kind of debacle as the F.E.A.R. sequel, just because it's got the Guitar Hero outfit, doesn't mean it's got the Guitar Hero soul. I'm being metaphorical if you didn't catch that. But seriously, try playing the game, or at least reading about it, don't just go on the name alone...

Red Rings Still Getting Microsoft in Trouble

So i was reading about this today and was reminded of a friend who tried to convince me that the Playstation 3 hardware breaks down more often than the Xbox 360 hardware. Well...guess he wont' be getting any money from this suit then...

If i could paraphrase a Papa John's commercial: "Better ingredients, better system; Playstation."

(PS3) Dead System Space Shock

So i've been fairly excited about Dead Space since it's initial announcement. Even more so with the "animated comics" that have been released on the PSN the past few months, and the visual style of these comics being reminiscent of 30 Days of Night just pushes that excitement a little further.
But the thing that really gets my survival sci-fi juices flowing even more than IGN's encouraging review is how much the game reminds me of System Shock 2. System Shock 2 remains, to this day, one of my favorite games of all time. The "spiritual" predecessor to BioShock, this game was once eclipsed by the original Half-Life. While Half-Life was a phenomenal, genre-changing game in it's own right, i'm of the opinion that System Shock was the vastly superior title.
Utilizing the same character customization abilities you find in BioShock, system shock set it's story upon a massive, derelict spaceship. Something has gone horribly wrong since the crew discovered something on one of the planets they explored and it has since turned the other crew members into zombie-like monsters. Anyone seeing the similarities to Dead Space yet? All this is made even more interesting by the fact that EA, Dead Space's publisher, was the original publisher for System Shock 2. The developer, Irrational Games, became 2k Boston which made BioShock. However EA still owns the rights to System Shock, which is why BioShock wasn't a direct sequel and why lead designer, Ken Levine, wasn't even allowed to meniton the System Shock games in interviews about BioShock. Hmmm...
I don't want to say too much more for fear of ruining this game's outstanding story, but you should def read about the story of the first game here as it'll come up in the second (especially if you're paying attention) and then go find yourself a copy of the game and play it. I recommend getting the "rebirth" patch to improve the graphics as well...it's a very noticeable difference. You can def find a System Shock 2 torrent to download somewhere, although i must note High Technology does not condone piracy. (hah! take that you legal types) Even though the game is nearly a decade old and it's highly unlikely there are any retail versions available to purchase even if you wanted to go that route.
But anyways, find it, play it, remember it. And by the time i do all that i should have bought, played, and reviewed Dead Space and we can all see how it stacks up.

Use your voice: Don't vote.

Goin a little off topic today, but with the current event foremost in a lot of people's minds, the presidential election, i thought i'd share something:

The electoral college perpetuates a system that is so broken the majority of the country can vote for one candidate and the presidency still goes to another. A system that renders my vote essentially worthless. This is like asking a child what they want for dinner then, after they tell you cake, going ahead and making spaghetti anyway. If you don't believe i have the intelligence to make the decision don't insult me by casting the illusion that i have a say in the matter. I refuse to participate until such a fundamentally flawed system is fixed.
So as much as i'd love to finally have health insurance made possible for me by Obama's universal healthcare plan, (with the added bonus of it being paid for largely by raising taxes on all the rich bastards Bush has been giving breaks to the past 8 years) i still refuse to participate in this election. I may worry that we will end up with the same "just do it my way and the hell with the rules" mentality in McCain that has been driving us into the ground via Bush for the past 8 years (although he seems far more intelligence and has several good ideas for change and improving our country's situation) i still will not vote. So no, facebook, bug me all you want, i still won't vote. No, MTV, as cool as you think your ads are, i still won't vote. No, random ensemble of celebrities, your reverse psychology tv ad won't work on me, i WILL NOT VOTE.
But my voice alone will do nothing. So i urge you, do not vote (or maybe vote Obama and save this for 4 years from now...i need health insurance dammit). But don't' simply abstain, tell everyone WHY you're not voting. Tell them you refuse to bend to this arbitrary process until your vote actually carries some weight and your decision might actually influence who becomes president. We are not children asking that we have cake for dinner, we are adults making a decision about who is going to be running the country we live in. That's why we have to wait until we're 18 isn't it?

(PS3) Warhawk: Get in the ZONES!

Now, i still LOVE Warhawk and the Icarus Jetpacks turned out to a be a lot more fun and balanced than i thought they would...but why is it no one seems to play Zones? I personally consider Zones to be the best game type Warhawk has to offer, although i still haven't made my decision on Hero or Collection. For one the implementation of the Zones (across all the game types) is pretty unique to Warhawk, secondly it offers far more strategy than DM, TDM, or even CTF, and lastly, it's one of the best ways to earn points in ranked matches. Sure you can get more points for capturing or returning a flag, but you have to be that ONE guy who pulls it off. In Zones there's plenty of zone capturing and defense to be had by all. And think of the fun when the other team thinks they're pwning you as they capture zone after zone all the way to your base, only to have you and/or a couple teammates sneak to the other, relatively undefended side of the map to capture zones behind the enemy line, forcing them to return back in that direction. This splits their forces between two battlefronts (although yours will be as well...likely to a lesser degree) and creates a pincer as you have their team sandwiched in between two forces of yours. FUN!! So Warhawk players everywhere, get out there and get in them ZONES!!!