Where to start..? The beginning maybe? :lol:
I went into Game a couple of weeks ago to do some trade ins and pick up Crisis 2 for Minor_Furie. I ended up with Crisis 2, Dead Rising 2 and £15 of Reward Points, all for about £20 of actual spend, which was a bargain (they had a special offer on trade ins, plus both DR2 and Crisis 2 had an extra £2.50 on them).
So I've had the £15 of reward points burning a hole in my pocket. I'm also aware I was away on holiday last week and the PS Store was due back up with free games. So I needed portable gaming, and after a games draught for months, I was due a real downpour.
So, after reading
Lego Pirates of the Caribbean reviews, I worked out the PS3 version was going to be just the same old pap as the previous Lego games.
Don't get me wrong, I love the idea behind them. I love the witty cut scenes that tell the stories. I love the charm and I love the love that goes into them. I hate the delivery of the actual game though. The platforming is always really tedious. There's often no real guide as to your position in 3D space, shadowing and the like doesn't exist/work. You'll also find yourself jumping at slippery walls trying to get onto a platform that you can't seem to reach, just to find out it's smaller and nearer the front of the screen, rather than large and on a level with you. I just find them devastatingly aggravating. After repeat ad infinitum versions in different guises it holds no appeal. I've played every version, either the full game (first two Lego Star Wars) or demos and I've had enough.
However, I'm after a new 3DS game, and thought I'd see what the reviews of the 3DS version say. They say... Not as "full blown" as the big console versions, but game play is much better - the 3D works.
So, Game had it cheap, with another £2.50 back off it and I ordered it.
So,
Lego Pirates of the Caribbean - 3DS It's great. It finally, finally, finally works. I don't care about anything else, the game actually works, you can judge your position in 3D space and it just works! You can enjoy all the puzzle solving and replaying without (very much) aggravation. The fact there's only you, not two characters works better too, you're not relying on the AI, it's also streamlined for the DS (the 3DS version is an upgraded version of the DS) and the game flows much better. It's still a simple, kid friendly Lego platform game, but family_Furie all love it.
I downloaded the PS3 demo when the store came back online. I have to say, the game is gorgeous, it's a stunning looking Lego title, but I hated it. The cut scenes are longer than the 3DS version and the puzzles more complex/involved, but I didn't enjoy playing it. Before reaching the end I'd suffered a few fatalities or minutes of hopeless jumping due to the system being crap and I just deleted it with no desire to ever play the game again.
One thing that is disappointing with the 3DS version is as I mentioned above, the cut scenes have been massively cut back. It feels like you're missing something. The more involved puzzles would have been really annoying on the DS, so dropping them was a good move, but missing out on the scenes really detracts a little from the over all game experience.
Still, it's a solid game, great fun and has kept me (and the family) entertained - 8/10.
I'm going to tag onto this a bit of a review of the 3DS now I've had it a while. Noth Lego POTC and Ridge Racer have hammered something home - the system has massive short comings in the "power" department. Lego POTC is cut back, I assume for space saving as the cartridges are limited. Until I saw the PS3 version, I didn't realise how poor the graphics were on the 3DS either. An early system will often have poor graphics, and the 3DS is pumping out double images, so it's doing well - but the games so far are around Gamecube quality (so poor Wii) and I don't think they're even as good as most PSP games. It's all about gameplay though...
Well, that's an issue too. Finding decent gameplay on it is tough. Pilot Wings Resort was awful. Well, it wasn't, but it was so bland and there wasn't really any reward to it. It's not the systems fault that there's no really decent games, but I think Nintendo have created a "different" gaming culture, one which I don't really get on with. Still, I actually love the interactive stuff (as does Maxi-Minor_Furie). Street pass is fantastic. I love taking my 3DS out with me and seeing if I meet anyone and putting them against the ghosts in the tower. Also, the update is due out this week so the store will come online too which will help.
My issue is that Nintendo have made a 3D version of the PSP, only five years later. The only really innovative (and advanced if you like) feature is the street pass stuff - everything else Sony were there first. I already have a PSP, so it seems a bit silly. So, jury is still out. I love some bits of the 3DS, some of it is completely pointless (like the mp3 player) and I'm hoping that future games and the new update will make things better.
Ridge Racer 3DS - picked this up for £20 with all my Game Reward Card points. I was certainly after portable gaming and love racing games, so it made sense. It's had good reviews too. It's actually pretty good, but again, it suffers from "would have been brilliant five years ago, but today..?" The graphics (which everyone raves about) are very poor. Drive your "shiny (but looks like every other car on the track)" oddly named vehicle around a bunch of bland, forgettable tracks (with some gorgeous backgrounds, but the actual car and track details you're looking at are dreadful). The game is fun though. It's mildly challenging, and getting a drift right (the entire idea is to learn to drift almost everywhere) is exhilarating.
It's just all so "old hat arcade game" though. You win the races which unlocks some more cars you don't care about to race in some more races you don't car about on some more tracks you don't car about. It's all fun when you're racing, but three races into a Grand Prix, and you forget why you're racing, or what your progress is to be or why you're bothering. It's a good "release title" and I'm glad I picked it up essentially for free.
Then I went on holiday for a week while the PS Store came up, but...
Star Wars - Arcade!!! An arcade at Hayling Island had an original sit in cabinet of the original Atari Star Wars game. 30p later and I could relive my youth
I played this a lot in arcades in the 80's, bought the Spectrum version, bought the Atari ST version and downloaded it for Mame. Nothing beats the crackly bass and "realistic" flight control stick of the original arcade version though. 30p for ten minutes of regained youth - awesome. Minor_Furie also loved it. Classic game, well worth revisiting once every 20 years
Okay, so the PS Store came back with an absolute bucket load of demos and games. Most of it takes three hours to download and five minutes to delete. I found myself oddly addicted to the Block stacking Mini given away free with PS+ I thought it would be the usual throw away turd they normally are (most PS Minis are vague copies of iPhone apps with a higher price tag, or so poor not even Apple would sell them). It's nice to find the odd gem. If you grab it, give it a go. The first stages are pretty dull, but it rapidly gets really tricky as you try to balance really odd shaped objects on a "scale".
However, the most exciting thing about the PS Store coming back was Maxi-Minor_Furie finally got to buy
Plants Vs Zombies - PS3
We're not into letting him buy games generally, but allow him to save some money each month towards one to make sure he really wants it. It's been about six months since he played the demo (and loved it) and he's been saving since. I enjoyed the demo, but thought £12 was a bit steep for a PS3 port of an iPhone title. It IS really good though. I hate agreeing with hype, but it's excellent. We've had a great weekend of mowing down zombies and it encourages planning, problem solving and a bit of thought rather than mindless button mashing, so it's all good. Was it worth £12? Not in terms of quality and development time, but in terms of "entertainment", yes... 9/10
I also go to download two games for my PSP, Modnation Races and Killzone Liberation. I've not play KZL as I don't like the franchise, but Minor_Furie says it's really good. I put some time into
Modnation Racers - PSP
It's a superb evolution of the Kart Racing genre. The studio have sat down and said "what can we add to the games to bring them bang up to date? We have a ton of buttons and stuff, so let's do it".
So there's lots of new additions like boosting (and boost attacks), stomping as you land, side-swiping, stunts in the air - just lots of new(ish) ideas all in one. On top, they've added a fantastic amount of customisation. So you have that pull of winning races to unlock new parts for your racer, kart and tracks (there's a full track editor too). There's so much packed in, it's unreal. Also, in stark contrast to the 3DS games I've been playing, the game is fantastically presented, it's got real career progressions and a lot of thought has gone into rewarding you and engaging you. It also looks pretty good.
However, with all of this, somebody forgot something... They bundled all of this onto the game, but nobody actually played the basic game. Mario Kart (the original) is still a fun game to play without anything fancy. The core gameplay is solid and engaging and this has passed down to each iteration of Mario Kart. MNR fails this. The game is actually incredibly frustrating to play. There are walls that you hit and stop you dead (add on scenery that cause "traps"), the drifting system is fiddly and a lot of the systems (such as drafting) just don't work on a kart racer. It's not pleasant to actually race, which is kind of the point. So much brilliance marred by a failure to actually look at what the game is supposed to do. Still, it was free
7/10 (if you can put in enough time and effort to "learn" the game).
Longest. Post. Ever. And it continues.
So, Pilot Wings is pants, and Ridge Racer doesn't deliver (also Dead Rising 2 is not very good after the first few hours). So, I trade them in at HMV (of all places). £50 for the lot, which isn't bad considering Pilot Wings was free with the 3DS and Ridge Racer was only £20 (£19 trade in value=win).
I used it to pick up two games I actually wanted (and these will end this epicness for the moment).
Dirt 3 - PS3 - it's no secret I love the CodeMasters' racing games. I've been playing them since the original Toca came out. They appeal to me with the right balance between arcade and simulator (I believe a good game should always challenge you, but at the same time make you feel like you're "there" - I couldn't get into a rally car today and drive it as well as I can drive one on Dirt 3 (and I couldn't drive a simulator car as well as I could drive a real one), but the game says I'm a driving pro, so it makes me feel like one).
It's the same thing as the previous ones. It's grittier, with some quite stark and harsh graphics actually - I miss the brightness of Dirt 2 to be honest. It's not as annoying though with the X-Games crowd chirping away all the time. The game is more focussed on rallying and it does it well.
After playing Dirt and Dirt 2 to completion though, I didn't want another Dirt game, I wanted another Grid
So I'm loving it, I love the games in the series, but it's disappointing because it's not what I want. Lovely presentation, great handling, great fun, great career progression - it's exactly what I was expecting. 9/10 really, but hurry up and give us Grid 2!!!
Finally,
Super Scribblenaughts. I looked at the original when I heard of the idea way back before it was released. I loved the idea of being able to create anything to solve puzzles. However, the reviews of the original were poor, saying it was "flawed genius". Seeing the opportunity to get the "fixed" follow on, I couldn't resist. It's absolutely brilliant, such a superb idea for a game. The basic completion for a level is pretty "meh", but trying to find four different ways to complete it is brain hurtingly difficult. How many different words to describe a cow's home are there??? One of those "why did I wait so long?" games. Well worth the trade in, really superb game and a "must have" for any DS owner (yay, a brilliant DS game) - 9/10.
Phew, said it would be a major update! :lol: