Today, I and a friend of mine went on a trip that we’ve been planning for a year now; a short trip to the top of a small mountain just outside Oslo. Now, that is all well and good, but we thought it would be fun if we brought some figures with us. Said and done, I brought my Miyuki figma and my Lumix LX3 (Thanks to Danny Choo for recommending it. It’s a jewel.) and my friend brought his KagaMiku and Yoko nendoroids.

Normally it takes about 1,5 hours up and down the hill, but we ended up spending double the time thanks to the constant photography pressure we had from those small city girls.
…and right now, they’re nagging for us to post them pics, so… let’s post them.

They’re cheering now.

それは何ですか？ :O

So this is the forest..?

KagaMiku likes frolicking in the moss.

Hiii!

Yoko is doing some guerilla training.

Peek-a-boo!

Seriously, we can't even turn our backs to them for one second before they start doing something weird...

They seem to be BFFs...

High altitude train spotting. Pardon the instance of open shirt, but it was hot as hell ^^;

I fail at holding Miyuki straight... :<

Om nom nom...

Enjoying the view.

Now, this is a good father. Don't look down...

...I better call a parenting school.

Yes, KagaMiku, you're looking at a ~340 m drop.

What a sweet way to end the trip :3

We will probably do this again.

Several times.

I’ve decided to try out a new little spin on game reviews, namely a system where I just write things I say when I play a game. Based upon those exclamations, you can tell if a game is good or bad, or basically if it’s fun or not. That’s the major point. This won’t replace my regular reviews, but they will probably be posted more often as they’re way easier to write. I like doing full game reviews, but I don’t always have (or take) the time to write them.

The first game to try out this formula is Left 4 Dead, because…well it’s a logical game for exclamation based stuff. So, my review is as follows:

“OHMYGODRUNRUNRUNRUN! SSSHIIIITTT!!! UWAH! HELP! LOLOLOLOLOL DID YOU SEE THAT? XD WHOA! THROW A PIPE BOMB! I’M DOWN! I’M DYING! Thanks! BEHIND YOU! It’s eerily quiet now, isn’t it? OHHOLYSHIIIITT!!! TANK!!!!! GET TO HIGH GROUND!”
*the survivors have been overwhelmed*

I’ve finally setup my blog on Feedburner (something I should have done long ago), so if anyone for some mysterious reason subscribed to the old WordPress feed, I’d be much obliged if you updated that subscription to point to the new Feedburner feed. The button on the bottom of the sidebar has been updated with the new address.

Thanks!

I’ve been playing Left 4 Dead ever since the demo went public on November 12th and after the game was released two days ago…well, school work’s been suffering. Left 4 Dead is such an amazing game that I could write a 200 page novel just coming up with superlative adjectives describing it. Sure, it’s not without its bugs and annoyances, but those are generally minor and will probably be fixed soon anyway.

But playing the game with one or more friends with voice chat is so much fun, as you always have someone to share those “OMG didyouseethat? awesome, man! LOLOLOLOL! RALF!” moments with. It’s just like playing the ultimate survival movie sometimes, and that’s what this post is about.

I decided to write down some of the epic moments we’ve come across, making them a bit more interesting in the process. These short stories will be known as “The Left 4 Dead Epics”. I don’t know how long I will keep finding time from slaughtering zombies to write these, but I’ve at least got one.

So, without further ado, here’s the first installment of The L4D Epics!

The Bridge

“There’s the bridge!”
Zoey picked up the pace. She knew that the safety of the supply caboose was waiting on the other side. After fighting their way through hordes and hordes of zombies, they could finally get some rest.
But halfway across she stopped dead in the train tracks. She turned around, stopping the others.
“There’s a witch in front of the caboose,” she whispered. “Whatever are we going to do?”
She glanced at Francis. He was carrying a propane tank.
“I think we both know the answer to that question,” he smiled, lobbing the canister towards the witch. He fired his gun. The witch ate fire and gravel. She got furious, lunging at the four survivors. They fired their weapons all they could trying to protect Francis, who so selflessly sacrificed his safety for the sake of the team.
“Keep firing!” Bill yelled.
“I can’t fire any faster than this!” Louis answered, sweating from working against the recoil of his M16.
The witch was just about to sink her claws into Francis’ face when she fell to the ground.
“We…we did it?” Zoey couldn’t believe she was looking at a dead witch. A witch without any of their blood on her hands.
Bill broke the following silence. “We’re not safe yet. Let’s keep moving.”
They ran.
Ten meters away from the door, Bill was yanked backwards, screaming.
“Smoker’s got Bill!” Zoey screamed.
In terror, the team watched as a Boomer approached Bill’s new, involuntary position. Whatever they did now, shoot or wait, would end up with Bill getting covered in tasty bile.
They fired.
Both the Smoker and the Boomer exploded.
“RUN!” Zoey was already heading towards the caboose. The four survivors ran as fast as they could, all the while firing at the thundering horde towering up on the other side of the bridge. They were closing in fast. Bill, vomit-soaked and dazed, was lagging behind, frantically shooting at the zombies. He could see their mouths water by the smell of the Boomer’s vomit.
The others were already in the caboose.
“Come on! Faster!” Zoey yelled as she fired out the door. The terror she felt as she saw the infected horde close in was impossible to describe. Normally a sunset like this would have been impossibly beautiful, but now…terrifying. Bill collapsed through the door. Zoey yanked at it, slamming it shut. One second later they could hear the zombies claw at the door…

]]> http://even248.wordpress.com/2008/11/20/the-left-4-dead-epics-vol-1-the-bridge/feed/ 0 Kantana http://even248.wordpress.com/2008/06/12/reviewrant-trials-2-second-edition/ http://even248.wordpress.com/2008/06/12/reviewrant-trials-2-second-edition/#comments Thu, 12 Jun 2008 17:25:10 +0000 Kantana http://even248.wordpress.com/?p=36 ]]>

Courtesy of RedLynx, the classic Trials game has finally moved to next-gen…and it makes me want to go on a rampage in a certain developer’s office.

This won’t be a regular review as much as it will be venting of the frustration that has built up while playing this game. So with that out of the way, let’s rant!

A game is a game for a reason. It’s supposed to be recreation, fantasy and escape from our miserable daily lives. Video games let us experience something we would never be able to experience in real life. For instance, Unreal Tournament lets us take on the role as an elite competitor in a game of pure death. Trials, on the other hand, lets us experience something we could easily experience in real life: falling of a bike…minus the pain.

I played the demo of Trials 2 SE the moment it came out and was hooked. I could finally return to the classic Trials stages, but with great graphics, improved physics and awesome achievements. Or so I thought until I bought the game the day after.

I got through the easy difficulty stages fast enough and without much trouble and moved on to the medium ones. Here the advanced techniques came into play, which took a little getting used to. After having played the game for a week, I felt I had learned the basic advanced techniques that are described in the tutorials, but I still could not clear the medium stages as fluidly as I could the easy ones.

Sure, medium difficulty is supposed to be harder than easy difficulty, but still, going from 4 faults a stage max to 40 in a single stage is a clear indication that the difficulty progression is way unbalanced. Now, after playing for almost 30 hours I can clear the medium stages almost as easily as the easy ones, but I don’t really feel that the frustration I experienced leading up to this point was worth it. So now that medium is conquered, it’s time to break the hard ones…if it was possible, that is.

After clearing the last medium stage, the first four hard ones are relatively easy. However, at hard-5…well, quoting Yahtzee: “…I came to a screeching halt, because they are fucking impossible!” For some reason, the developers expect you to easily climb a 80º hill, which I suspect to be utterly impossible. So I accepted the dare and started climbing. Before long, my nose was in the air and my skull was implanted in the ground.

Remembering the tutorials, I tried to be careful on the accelerator and keep my weight forward. This made me slide backwards with my rear in the air and my skull implanted in the ground.

After learning to control the loss of traction (if it can even be called “control”) and to keep the back wheel on the ground I found myself sliding backwards, hitting a plank, causing me to spin around to implant yet another skull in the ground.

After a looong time I finally started to get the hang of getting the bike more than halfway up the hill. I could finally see the top…before:

With the help of some mysterious force I actually managed to clear this hill and all its charming relatives except the last hard stage; Inferno. I know, I know, it’s the final stage in the game, but it’s still way too hard. When I can clear all the stages up until the last one, you’d expect to have the experience and training necessary to complete it, right? Wrong! I can’t even get to the first checkpoint, because there’s a fucking barrel in the way.

I have tried at least 200 times to get past that first obstacle, but I can’t. The first barrel always sends me flying back down so I can cheerfully give the ground another implant. If I manage to get across it, my front wheel gets stuck before the second standing barrel and when I try to free myself from it, I fall back down again.

In conclusion, I think this game is too fucking hard. There should have been an easier mode for those who just want a quick fix of awesome bike riding. After just playing the demo, I thought I could handle the game, but that was only because I hadn’t played the harder levels…because none of them were in the demo. If I had known how hard and frustrating the game was, I’m not sure I would’ve bought it. Well, not the best $8.99 I’ve spent.

One of the game’s sales points is realism, but I can’t really imagine a bike going up 80º slopes in real life. Neither do I see brakes that don’t work and back wheels that rise uncontrollably all the time as very realistic. Also, the realism is one of the things that makes this game so goddamn hard. As I said, a more casual mode would have been very welcome for those of us who haven’t got alien hands with their own sense coordination or nothing else to do so we can spend all our time awake practicing.

I doubt I’ll ever get the “True Fan” achievement…

TRON 2.0 is a must-have at least for all who enjoyed the cult classic movie TRON, even though others can enjoy it as well.

Story
The storyline in TRON 2.0 picks up some time after the end of the movie. Alan Bradley, now a highly respected senior programmer working at Encom, tries to get his son Jet a decent job within the company, but Jet spends all his time playing and making games. As they argue about this on the phone, Alan gets unexpected and unwelcome visitors. Jet immediately runs to his father’s lab, but finds no one except Alan’s computer with an A.I. called Ma3a. Ma3a says some of her files are hit by a corruption and without even being asked, Jet is zapped into the computer to help her.
In addition, a company called fCon is trying to buy Encom. Alan Bradley does not approve this, and he knows what’s best for the company since he has been with it from the start. This boils down to Jet having to save both Ma3a, his father and the computer world. It all concludes with a pretty spectacular boss battle.

Graphics:
It’s hard to compare the graphics in TRON 2.0 with any other game, so I won’t.
The game features the exact same style of graphics the original movie had. Simple environments with lots of boxes and straight lines and surfaces. The best feature is the classic neon-glow around the edges of every object on the screen. This makes you feel even more like being in your favorite movie. The glow is more present in 2.0 than in the most of the original movie, but the game would have been a little boring without. The character models are nicely detailed as well. Intricate patterns of differently colored light float around their bodies and makes enemies easy to spot as they light up even more when in combat. Some areas are mildly said huge open space, like inside Fcon’s firewall or the TRON Legacy Code archive. When I say huge, I don’t mean it like free-roaming huge, but it’s really massive and you may feel a little insignificant looking at these areas. The environments are generally gorgeous to look at, and wherever you are there are always something exciting to look at that reminds you of the movie. Every world has each own color, so it’s easy to identify each area.

Sound
The sound is extremely well done. Since the story plays out inside a computer, the sounds and music have to fit to the setting. That goal is indeed achieved. The music is dynamic, just like in NOLF, and each world has a different music style. To compare a couple of worlds, the music from Alan’s desktop PC is relatively calm with lovely plinging sounds, whereas the corrupted server has music filled with suspense, freaky voices and old modem sounds. The Internet has fast business style music with phone rings.
The sound effects are great as well. Everything has an electronic sound, even the voices. It’s hard to really describe the sound without an example, but nothing inside the computer sounds like in real life. The voices, as I mentioned, sounds a bit like extremely natural computer generated voices. They have a metallic sound to them, which makes all the characters seem even more real/virtual, depending on how you see it.

Controls & Gameplay
Being an FPS, the controls are not much to discuss. With the left mouse button you fire, and with the right mouse button you can use your disc to block incoming enemy discs, sending them flying wildy around. If your disc is out and not out of control the right mouse button calls it back. If you hold the left mouse button down you can guide the disc where you want it to go. Pressing F1 pauses the game and brings up the subroutines screen.
Subroutines are small programs you can install into your memory to upgrade your abilities or get new ones. The first one you get is Y-Amp, which allows you to jump higher. Some subroutines are armor, some are combat (modifications of the basic weapons) or utilities. You have limited space in your memory (depending on the system you’re in), so you’ll have to choose carefully. Although you can press F1 and switch between the subroutines at any time, it can be stressful when surrounded. As you progress through the game you get better versions of the subroutines. The alpha version is not very effective and takes up three slots of memory, the beta is better and takes two slots and the gold is even more effective and takes only one slot.
If you get problems with your subroutines, such as if they’re corrupted or you get one that’s not compatible, you have three procedurals at your hand. Defragment, port and disinfect.
You have three indicators at the bottom of the HUD displaying your health, energy and permissions. You need energy to use certain weapons (such as the rod and the mesh) and their mods and to transfer data from the data archives scattered around the maps. These archives contain either permissions, subroutines or e-mails/video archives. The permissions give you access to certain areas by requirements for opening doors or allow you to use objects.
The e-mails you obtain tell the background story for the game. You can find e-mails from 1982 to 2003. These can be read at any time by pressing 9.
If you ever run low on health or energy you can look for the health, energy and infinite energy patch routines. They function much like medkits.
Through the game you meet enemies like the ICPs (Intrusion Countermeasure Programs), Z-Lots (corrupted programs), Rector Scripts (scripts converting other programs to Z-lots), Resource Hogs and fCon’s DataWraiths. The resource hogs are programs that use huge amounts of resources. Ironically enough, they are often called word.exe or wordedit.exe. They use the suffusion subroutine, which is a shotgun modification of the rod primitive. If they get close to you, you’re bound to get a lot of damage, so take them out quickly. The DataWraiths are fCon’s specialized computer hackers. Their task is to take over computers from the inside. Their weapon of choice is the mesh.
You get four basic weapons throughout the game: The Disc, the rod primitive, the ball primitive and the mesh primitive. The Disc is your primary weapon, known from the movie. The rod is the handle rod from a light cycle, which can be modified in various ways. The ball is a corruption based weapon you throw. It functions somewhat similar to a grenade. The mesh is the last weapon you get, and is a blaster type weapon with a high rate of fire.
As a program, you’re updated regularly. Around the maps there are a given amount of build notes. When you pick these items up your get 2 build points added to your version number. When you complete levels you also get a given amount of build points. When you reach a new version you can upgrade your max health, energy, weapon efficiency, transfer rate and your processor. Your processing power decides how long the procedurals take to finish.
Of course, the light cycle race is included, with a new super light cycle and lots of challenging grids and useful power-ups.
The first time you start playing the game it can be a little overwhelming and disorienting and the difficulty may seem a little high, even on easy. However, the second time I played it it was much easier.

Phew…

Computer language
Throughout the game you will hear and see a lot of phrases that are taken from everyday life and twisted a little so they fit in perfectly. For instance, take the phrase: In your face, asshole! In TRON 2.0 they say: In your interface, program!. You’ll also hear the obvious You can’t hide from me, I know all the shortcuts. If you derez a civilian program it’s game over and you hear Illegal Program Termination. I could go on and on listing incredible amounts of geeky phrases, but I’d rather let you experience them yourself if you are to play the game. On the Internet a script starts that displays ads. The script obviously bypasses the spam blocker.

TRON 1.0 references
In one of my favorite worlds, you enter the old Encom mainframe from the movie. It has been in sleep mode for a long time and on arrival you meet I-No, an old program who knows everything about the system. Proudly he presents you with the system specs: EN12-82, top-of-the-line mainframe, capable of 16-bit processing, full monochromatic display support and a local storage of 128 megabytes. I challenge you to find a more robust system.
In this system you encounter the tank programs known from the movie. They’re started with a humorous build note: Tanks are read-only and indestructible. Enjoy ;)
And lastly some trivia for fans of the movie: Note what the password is in the tank script.

Conclusion
This game is one of the most successful movie licensed games I’ve ever seen, and standing just as a regular game, it’s also one of the most original ones. Every computer geek who’s into games has to play it. Its attention to detail in the programs’ names and the fact that there’s a night club called the Progress Bar is good enough reason in my eyes. Although the game felt a little difficult and disorienting the first time I started playing it, it was well worth playing on.

Score
9.2/10

Replace James Bond with a Scottish woman, add some twisted humor and interesting gadgets and you have the recipe for NOLF.

Story
Without going too much into detail, I can say that the game takes place in the ’60s and an organization by the name H.A.R.M. is planning to take over the world with a newly created toxin that will cause every victim it’s injected into to explode after some time. It’s up to you, Cate Archer, an operative in the agency “Unity”, to stop these psychos from succeeding.

Graphics
Considering this game came out in 2000, the visuals aren’t much to brag about today. But thanks to the intense colors in some parts of the game, especially on Archer herself, it still has it’s charm.
The many faces in the game are modelled nicely for the time and they all look great. The only bad thing is that they only have one expression, and the only thing that moves is their mouths, but it’s no big deal. The main characters are easy to recognize from far away due to very characteristic clothing.
I haven’t noticed too many graphical glitches in the game, but I’m sure there are some.

Sound
I don’t really have much bad to say about the audio in NOLF.
The classic spy style music fits perfectly with the ’60s theme and enhances the feel in every way possible. The game also features sour, horrible opera and funky grooves in nightclubs, amongst other styles.
The voice acting is superb, with very characteristic voices on some of the main characters. Amongst others, I can mention a burly Scottish man (usually drunk to some degree), a fat, German woman who loves to sing, even though she can’t and a handsome, fellow operative from the USA.
The sound effects are good, with quite realistic sounds for all weapons, and when you kill someone you usually hear them scream loudly in pain. The occasional bikes and snow scooters sound good too, although the sound cuts off at times and starts over again. This isn’t anything I’m bothered by though.

Controls & gameplay
The control scheme should be familiar to anyone who has played an FPS before. You have a button to walk and one to crouch. These buttons should be taken into use often, since the game gets a lot harder if you’re detected and the alarm sounds. Many missions also have stealth as a requirement for success, so you can’t set off any alarms. One mission is completely stealth, no casualties allowed. This level is riddled with security cameras, so you should get used to taking things slow in these portions of the game. If you encounter an object that can be used, like doors and switches, you can activate these by pressing the right mouse buttons. This works well, and helps keeping things easy to do fast.
As a spy you have many gadgets at your disposal to make your day easier. Some of the most useful ones are the barrette, which contains a poison needle and can be used as a lock pick, the modified cigarette lighter, which can be used as a welder, the code breaker, which allows you to get through keypad protected doors and the sunglasses, which can take pictures of important objects, see infrared beams and detect mines.
You have a wide variety of guns at your disposal, but you can only pick two or three of them at the beginning of each mission. If you encounter more guns through the level you can pick them up as well.
Your arsenal includes pistols, SMGs, an AK47, a sniper rifle, a crossbow, a grenade launcher, a spear gun and a laser gun prototype amongst others. In addition you have explosives disguised as lipsticks and various gases disguised as perfume.
Throughout the game you encounter intelligence items which contains information about everything and nothing. These are not usually vital to the success of your mission, but will help increase your rating at the end of each mission.
As far as bugs go, I have only found one, and that is that you can get stuck in and not get out of some places. Like in small hatches or behind signs outside that are close to the transition between for instance the grass and a rocky hill. I also found it hard to climb down some ladders without falling down instead or getting a lot of drop frames, but if you jump on it and crouch you should be fine.

Humor
This game is one of the funniest games I have ever seen, and deserves to have it’s own humour section, just to emphasize it.
I can’t find numbers for how many times I laughed playing through this game. It’s really that funny. In what other games can you find stupid code phrases like:
“Guten abend, Fraulein. Do you make love to strangers?”
“Certainly not!”
“Then allow me to introduce myself.”

Some of the jokes are a bit on the edge, like a man obviously having an affair with a goat.
But, if you like this kind of humor, you must play this game.

A lot of funny jokes can also be found in the memos you pick up along the way (intelligence items), and you can also view the ones you have found from the main menu in case you don’t have time to read them or want to read them again. You will notice names following you throughout the game, and reading the letters and memos will really boost the overall funny experience.
Example:
“Dear Selma,
I miss you terribly! Tell your mother I have a job now for a fine company, and the pay is very good. The only drawback is that I have to kill people from time to time, but the insurance policy is first-rate!
Love, Pierre”

Conclusion
This game should definitely be filed under classics, being the superb game it is.
This game is an ingenious work of art that belongs in every serious gamer’s collection.
NOLF will keep you going for some time. The game consists of 15 missions (16 in the Game of the Year Edition). Some of them are individual parts of a larger mission. I used 20-30 hours to complete it, and it’s absolutely a funny and original ride.
For a little more bang for your buck you should go for the Game of the Year Edition which includes an extra level after the credits have rolled by and some other bonuses.

I have been reviewing the Game of the Year Edition for PC.

Score
9.6/10

Just Cause isn’t really your typical GTA clone, but the well known free-roaming concept is there. And it’s taken to the limit…

Story
You play the role as Rico Rodriguez, a US undercover agent specialised in starting revolutions. You are sent to the island paradise of San Esperito to free it from the dictator Salvador Mendoza who has couped the position of president. To help you, you have the local guerilla and a PDA from the agency.

Graphics
The first thing you’ll notice is that the visuals are great. The scenery is showcased in an excellent manner as you start of parachuting from a plane. It’s a great deal of terrain that unfolds before your eyes, I’ll tell you that. If you’re planning to drive across the entire paradise of San Esperito, you’ll have to plan ahead, because that’ll take more than 20 minutes. Flying across takes a good eight minutes as well.
The only bad thing I have to say about the graphics is that the objects on the screen sometimes “duplicates” themselves onto the sky and leaves a darker colored field there, but that might as well be my graphics card or drivers.

Sound
The sound is realistic and immersive with a good amount of detail. I love standing on a beach next to a small village listening to the waves, crickets and the shouts from the merchants at the market selling coconuts, ice cream, beer and fish (all in Spanish), although the peace often is interrupted by the constant fights between the guerrilla and the government troops. And this is the weakest part of the entire game’s dialouge. In a South-American country you wouldn’t expect to hear “Achtung! Policía! Stop right there!”. I mean, what is this? German, Spanish and English? Okay, Spanish and English is fine to mix in a setting like this, but German?
The music fits very well into the setting with fast paced “tequila style” rhythms when driving, calm guitar when relaxing from fighting in a safehouse and action filled tunes when in a fight.

Controls & gameplay
The gameplay is easy to get into, but the controls are there on the spot to complicate everything.
Most ground vehicles feel like they’re driving on ice at times and the mouse sensitivity is way too low. I had to set my mouse to 2000 dpi to even get hold of the stuff that was going on without dying.
When you get on a bike for the first time you’ll most likely notice that they don’t lay over to the side when you turn. For them to do that you have to hold down either turn button for three seconds and you should be driving at speeds excess of 100 km/h.
The really new, exciting addition to the concept here is the ability to do some pretty sick stunts. You can stand on the roof of cars and boats and hang from the back of planes and helicopters. Then you can either enter/jack the vehicles or deploy your invisible parachute, which is always there. In addition you have a grappling hook that you can shoot after any vehicle and parasail after them with. Then you can reel yourself in on them and jack them in the normal manner. An effective way to get out of a tricky situation.
One feature I was missing from the controls is a crouch button. You won’t really need it because of the huge, open battlefields, but it would have been nice to include it. The camera can be controlled freely just like in GTA San Andreas, which is nice.
Aside from the main story, you have lots of side missions. You can either help the guerrilla liberate settlements and do other side missions for them, or help the Rioja drug cartel with taking over Montano drug cartel settlements or doing similar missions as those from the guerrilla, which is mainly “drive one place, get something, drive back with lots of police on your tail” or “kill that guy over there”. Although there isn’t much variation in these missions, it’s a change from the more difficult story missions.
The bigger cities are welcome variations from the jungle, but they lack detail, and there are absolutely no shops or interiors whatsoever. It would have been nice with at least a weapons shop and a hospital so you wouldn’t have to go back to a safehouse every time you needed health or ammo.
The agency PDA is very useful, because you can call for extraction, a vehicle drop, see a complete map over the island, political map and statistics and ranks. This works great except you can’t call for extraction or vehicles when in the bigger cities. The only thing that happens is you get a message saying “Agency not able to confirm your position. Please proceed to a clear, ground level area.” I thought asphalt was ideal for this? This can get frustrating since there aren’t that many vehicles driving around compared to the size of the city, so if you loose your car there, you should be prepared for some running.

Bugs
The game also has quite a few bugs. For instance, one of the more frustrating ones are that your allies have a tendency to run over you in a firefight if you stand in the middle of the road. Instant kill…
I also lost more than 50% of my health when I jumped from a helicopter. Rico somehow got his head into the rotor blades and there I was, mid-air, before the last mission, with less than half my health.
In addition, there was something that ruined most of my scenic trips through the country. Everywhere I went, there were fights. That’s natural in a revolution, but when I hear the police shouting “Stop, citizen!” all the time and it sounds as they’re breathing down my neck I can’t really be sure if they’re after me or not. At least the voices should be lower when they’re after other people than me.
I sure hope there’s a patch released soon that fixes most of these bugs, as this would make the game a lot better, both in “stability” and enjoyment.

Conclusion
Even though the world is absolutely huge, I – and I’m not an incredibly skillful player – didn’t use much time to complete the story (about 9-10 hours). I still have over half the country to take over, but this task gets repetitive. It would have been nice to see some interiors and deeper missions, but Just Cause is still a fun ride that will keep you going for some time…if you can endure without loosing your mind to the bugs.
And as a small bonus…if you can’t afford to pay for a real vacation, you can sit on your ass and drive around San Esperito.

I have been reviewing the PC version of the game.

Score
8/10

The open world, free-roaming sandbox has been with us since GTA 1, but yet has no game been as huge nor as much fun as GTA: San Andreas.

Story
You play as Carl Johnson (CJ), living in Liberty City. Your brother Sweet calls and breaks you the news on your mother’s death and You return to Los Santos to yattend her funeral. It turns out she’s been murdered by the Ballas gang, and within a short period of time you’re going on a revenge rampage across the whole state of San Andreas…with lots of distractions along the way.

Graphics
If you’ve played GTA 3 or Vice City, you already know the graphical style of GTA. In San Andreas there isn’t much difference. The almost cell-shaded look on the world and characters is intact, and the visual style overall is very similar. Of course, you can’t release a new game without improving the graphics at least a little bit, so this time there’s a very cool heat haze effects, improved explosions and generally more particles flying around. In general, all the effects have been bumped up a notch.
I have experienced some wierd shadows in places, especially in very narrow alleys, but those issues are very minor. Also, the cutscenes that are completely rendered in-game (without starting a separate movie) can look a bit awkward, most notably when the characters are in a car. This won’t bother you much though, as most of the cutscenes are obviously prepared for rendering with smooth and natural motions.
If you haven’t played GTA 3 or Vice City, just watch some trailers for either of the three games, as I won’t go about describing graphics that everyone should know.

Sound
As always, the sound design is excellent. Every radio station is well thought out, the voice acting is top-notch and the sfx are good. There isn’t much more to say here that’s negative.
The game starts off with a cutscene with some of the most killer voice acting I’ve ever heard. You get dragged into the mood of the game in an instant. This quality sticks with you until the very end of the game, and even after that. Personally, I have to say I haven’t played many games that have managed this.
After the voice acting comes the second reason for the impressive immersion the game displays, the soundtrack. The radio stations sound very realistic, as they now are dynamic. As you progress through the game, the news and shows change contents on the talk radio, and the DJs push out different phrases at different times of day and in different weather. Combined with an awesome soundtrack that fits the time period (the ’90s) perfectly this makes for some pleasant trips through the game world.
As far as sound effects go, they’re nothing special. They’re good, they do what they have to, but nothing more.
I experienced quite some problems with sound disappearing or sprackling noises in the past. I don’t know the cause for those problems, but they still appear eventually. It might have something to do with my sound drivers, but if you should experience similar problems you can rest assured that you’re not the only one.

Controls & gameplay
Controlling CJ is very simple and straight-forward, exactly as it should be. There are no big differences from the previous games, so the transition from Vice City to San Andreas goes without a hitch. Driving is pretty much like arcade, but with a little more simulation, as always. Flying planes are nothing like real life, as they’re easy to control. Still, they are your best means of travelling fast back and forth quickly and safely.
The gameplay has been improved 10x since the last incarnation of the series. The huge world around is far from empty, and contains side mission after side mission, providing lots of play time way after you’ve completed the main story. Also, there are various achievements and stats increases you can get by exploring and just fool around. The stats are new to the series. Now you can play the game more like an RPG, bumping up your vehicle and weapon skills and getting buff or fat. The way you play now actually has something to say for ow you have to complete your missions. If you’re nothing but a heap of muscles with high stamina you can kill people with a few punches and run the hell out there afterwards, but if you’re a sack of fat that drives everywhere you’ll have to rely on heavy weaponry and vehicles to survive.
Indoor locations have now become a very important part of the game. Almost 1/4 of the missions have something to do with an indoor location. It’s very nice to see the game world come to life with shops, restaurants and other places you can enter and actually make use of. Other than robbing them, I mean. Buying new clothes can, in addition to giving CJ a new, more personal style, increase your sex appeal, thus increasing your chance of getting the six girls that are scattered all over the state.
One of my favorite past time activities in GTA:SA is to just drive around the countryside and listen to the excellent country channel on the radio. It’s almost impossible to grow tired of the world of San Andreas. It’s so huge and varied that it takes at least a month of intense exploring to see it all, and three to six months to grow tired of it. And that’s only if you play it compulsively. The world features the three cities of Los Santos (Los Angeles), San Fierro (San Francisco) and Las Venturas (Las Vegas) and their respective countrysides. The terrain covered by countryside is actually a bit larger than that of the cities, and the cities are absolutely huge and stuffed with content. The countryside does not seem as filled with content at first glance, but there are lots of side missions, secrets and funny signs just waiting to be found all over the place, as well as opportunities to take a lovely cross country road trip.

Conclusion
I don’t think I’ve ever played a game bigger (with the same content ratio) and more immersive than GTA:SA, as it’s perfect in almost every way. A long story line with plenty of twists and distractions and more free-form missions than you could ask for makes this a ride you’ll want to take again and again, on a different path each time. The value you get for your money here is stunning, and if you’re so slow that you haven’t played this game yet, you should do so at once, for your own sake. Please…

I have been reviewing the PC version of the game.

Score
9.8/10

The master of adventure games, Charles Cecil, sends us out on yet another great quest, taking us from New York to Rome, through both Istanbul and Phoenix in search of a lost, godly weapon.

Firstly, I must say that I haven’t played any complete versions of the previous games in the series, so I will mostly review this game without comparing it to the others.
Story
George Stobbart is now working in a small detective office in Harlem, New York. One day a lady called Anna-Maria walks in the door and presents an old manuscript obviously leading to a hidden treasure. Just as he’s about to examine the manuscript the office is ambushed by gangsters looking for the manuscript and thus swept into another mystery: Who is this woman and why is the manuscript so important?

Graphics
It seems like the engine from the last game has returned. The graphics haven’t changed very much since last time, but they look good. The visual style is a little palette-like, giving the game some charm. It’s still realistic though, and the visual effects look extremely good if you consider the cartoonish flare over the rest of the game. The occasional heat haze and explosions look very satisfying indeed. Not that the rest of the game doesn’t look good, but it doesn’t showcase what the engine capable of, obviously.
I haven’t seen much of graphical flaws, and every location is full of color and variety, so there’s not much bad to say about the graphics other than that the game doesn’t utilize the engine to it’s fullest.

Sound
The overall sound design is very competent. The voice acting’s great, the soundtrack’s appropriate and the sound effects do their job well. However, I’ve experienced multiple times that the voices are cut off. This way I would have lost a a potentially important sentence here and there if I hadn’t enabled the subtitles.
as for the soundtrack, the ambient music isn’t constant, which is fine. This makes it a bit easier to concentrate on the riddles. Short cues play at regular intervals, and special clips play when you find the right solution to something or a vital clue.
The voice acting is believable and does a good job of conveying the mood of the characters, which is mostly being puzzled.
There isn’t a focus on sound effects in this game, as you’re mostly just standing still and figuring out how to get further, but the sound effects that are present do their job good and help bring the scenes to life.

Control & gameplay
As before, you use the mouse to play this game. You can either click on where you want to go or use the keyboard to move around. You run by holding shift. I needed some time to discover this because in previous games you ran by double clicking. The good old inventory menu and multiple interactions menus are of course working like a charm.
There’s not much innovation in terms of gameplay except a new hacking mini-game which is basically a fancy puzzle. The standard point-and-click gameplay is still intact and it still works. As they say: if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Conclusion
The Angel of Death is a great game, but it seems to me like this is just a small upgrade of the last game with a new story and new locations. Of course, I don’t know this for sure, but seeing as the graphics and gameplay are so identical, I can’t help but think so. A little innovation could do the trick, but it’s still a good experience, even though I only used about 12 hours to complete the game. I actually expected a little more intricate puzzles and a longer storyline from this game.
Overall though, the game is well worth the time, and is highly recommended.

Score
8.2/10