These videos (2 parts) gave a rather eloquent explanation:

Thankfully, Serious Sam 3 was kind enough to provide a setting to change the FOV. Now I no longer feel like I’m going to paint my walls a different colour.

I'm...so...ronery

LIMBO‘s appeal is not to draw gamers in with fancy graphics, classy voice acting, or even a complex storyline. LIMBO strengths lie in its atmosphere and simplicity.

LIMBO‘s colour palette matches its mood. Silhouettes and shades of grey belie a hint of the character’s surroundings – the spindly legs of a giant spider, the barest hint of a pit of spikes, the outline of a child hanging from a rope. The shadows and lack of visibility serve as the game’s natural hazards – traps and ambushes are not apparent until the very last minute, such as when you slide down a hill only to land in a pit of water obscured by black shadows.

It’s also surprisingly violent. For a no man’s land between the land of the living and the realm of the dead, there’s a lot of maiming and impaling going on. Traps can skewer and decapitate, and enemies can impale and toss corpses aside. Limbs are torn off. One insect in particular can latch onto your character’s head and act as a parasite, controlling your body to move in one direction or the other.

The game’s simplicity is reflected in its controls: left, right, jump, and interact. There is none of Braid‘s time-warping elements, nor any of Shadow Complex‘s gunplay or ability juggling. Your only weapons are your ability to solve puzzles and turn traps against those that wish to see you dead. In a sense, it underscores the vulnerability of your character – he is a little boy that wakes up in a world inhabited by sadistic children and killer insects. He isn’t fortunate enough to have any special powers or weapons that he can use. He can’t even swim. He’s simply avoiding death as best he can.

Perhaps that is one of the game’s shortcomings – the game’s simplicity limits the game to pure puzzle solving, all set in a macabre setting. At full RRP, it strains to sustain its appeal. Obscuring hazards in the game world feels overused and acts only as an uninspired means to add an edge to puzzles or to frustrate players thereby breaking up the monotony of puzzle-solving. Death doesn’t bring any lasting negative effects; respawns are close to the point of death and it turns into an exercise where the player must memorise the details of the current hazard, rather than learn from the experiences and applying the knowledge to future traps. Demon’s Souls this is not.

Regardless, there’s no denying that the game is full of character and atmosphere, and that it is a tightly executed piece of work. A good purchase for gamers looking for something minimalistic and moody.

Absorb ALL the souls.

Normally I’d dedicate more time to a game of this scope and depth, but I’m spending too much time actually playing the damned thing. There are also more than enough reviews out there that go into the nitty gritty details of it all, so I’ll be as concise as I can. This is, after all, a 5 Minute Review.

Skyrim has depth. It’s astounding exactly how much there is to see, let alone do. I’ve read accounts by elderly gamers who spend days simply wandering the hills and woods, encountering hamlets, towns and cities, surmounting alps during the day and following the streams at night. Quests soon heap up as you speak to more characters and further involve yourself in the affairs of Skyrim. Some may simply feel like fetch quests, but they run in tandem with other major quest lines, so if you happen to be in the area, you can fulfil commitments as you go. The game very rarely feels like a grind because your progression is consistent with your actions in game.

The combat system is progressive – for every successful action that occurs, you will gain experience. The more you use Heavy Armour, the more proficient you will be at using it. The more you Sneak and Pickpocket, the more those abilities will progress. Dual wielding abilities is also efficient – want to cast Flames in one hand and block melee attacks with the other? Wield a Stamina-sapping war axe in one hand and a life-leeching mace in the other? Go ahead.

The depth of Skyrim can get to the point where it becomes intimidating – where does one begin in a world where you are allowed free reign? For those gamers that need direction and clear cut instructions on what to do or where to go, they may find the whole affair frustrating.

The number of NPCs is impressive, but the voice acting may sound familiar after a while. I guess a Jarl can sound the same as a blacksmith. What truly stands out is the range of personalities you’ll come across. Maybe you’ll run into the aging orc warrior, lamenting for a glorious death. Perhaps you’ll see a farm owner, terrified to enter a fort occupied by bandits to save his captured wife. Maybe you’ll bump into a dispute between miners and brigands over a matter of unpaid taxes. Or perhaps you’ll encounter a Daedric lord, eager to end the lives of mortals on a whim. Characters have their own agendas, and will either reach out to you or twist you to their advantage (if you let them).

Skyrim‘s attention to detail is excellent. Townships and cities have their own unique feel – the cold hardened setting of Winterhall is a stark contrast to the temperate, sunny disposition of Whiterun. Dungeons range from Nord catacombs to underground Dwarven manufactorums. The land is peppered with wild bears and wolves, mages attempting to perform rituals in clearings, and the occassional dragon circling overhead. The presentation as a whole is amazing, and also scales rather well on mid-range hardware.

However, the game is not without its faults and shortcomings – bugs and glitches will create immovable NPCs, broken animations, bizarre physics and unfinishable quests. The good news is that these are either fixable or able to be ignored, but it does kill the immersion somewhat when a dragon you’re attacking suddenly starts floating through the air, and then you’re unable to absorb its soul after killing it.

The first few steps for an early level character can be tedious, too – it’s not quite at the same level as hacking at a dungeon rat with a bone for 5 minutes in a tutorial, but it can be intimidating to be sent flying into the air by a Giant’s club or attempting to perform a quest against a legion of Redguard warriors. In a way, it makes sense – scaling enemies with a player’s level offers no sense of advancement, and there is satisfaction in building up a character that can take on a pack of bears with a few swings of a warhammer.

I have barely scratched the surface in this review, because that would be a disservice to you, dear reader. It’s one thing to go on about Skyrim‘s world, and another to become a part of it. If you’re interested in getting lost in a world for a good 50 hours or so, you will find that $1.20 an hour is a pretty good investment.

I hate admitting stuff like this, but it’s true. I’m not a great Battlefield player. There are shining moments where I’m like a harbinger of death, raining hot lead on the oppressors, but most of the time I’m doing more harm than good. I feel like my ammo boxes are filled with scorpions and my guns are firing blanks.

I guess the best way to get better is to take a step back, examine one’s mistakes and really analyse what’s going wrong. So why, exactly, do I suck at this shit?

1. I don’t have enough hours invested.

As of writing, I have just over 25 piddly hours invested into the game. A very modest number, considering the length of time the game has been out thus far. Compare that to the people who have more than 500 hours invested thus far. You read that correctly. Five. Hundred. Hours.

Well, that's dedication.

Figures like this boggle my mind. I mean, really? This guy in particular has been playing since October 25th, which means he’s been playing for a grand total of 43 days. If my maths is up to scratch, that’s just over 11.5 hours of gaming a day. I barely manage to figure out what to eat for lunch, let alone play a game or 11.5 hours daily for 1.5 months straight. Even if it were more than one person playing, it takes about 20 people playing at my pace to draw equal with those kinds of figures.

I obviously need some of that time dilation technology.

2. I’m too easily distracted.

I guess I can’t blame EA/DICE for releasing Battlefield 3 early – there is a boatload of competition out there for our gaming dollar. Triple A titles clamour for our attention, hoping that copies of themselves will be present in Xmas stockings and under Xmas trees delivered by an Xmas entity.

Putting on the hurt in a different way.

Lately, games like Skyrim and Arkham City have been my biggest distractions, and it doesn’t help that they are both horrible time sinks. “Oh, it’s okay. I’ll just do one more quest before I finally go pee” is not an uncommon thought that goes through my head whenever I’m playing either of these games. And then there are the inevitable Steam sales, which are money vacuums unto themselves.

I’d love to devote more time to Battlefield, but sweet Jesus have mercy, it’s fucking great to be a Dovahkiin.

3. I have no role models in pub servers.

Then again, it can’t be all my fault. Yeah, that’s right. I’m pointing at you, champ. Have you seen the state of pub servers nowadays? If team mates aren’t boosting in the corner performing their bizarre kill/revive circle jerk, I’m trying to fight alongside wannabe bush wookies camping at spawn, or overzealous assault players continually reviving dead men in a murder hole while the enemy are acting like long lost battle brothers, coordinating our mutual destruction over Mumble from the lofty confines of their attack chopper, spewing Vulcan rounds and guided missiles at us. In the meantime, mortars rain down on us like Armageddon, turning choke points into a scene reminiscent of a World War I no-man’s-land.

Those on my team who actually do come to their senses and realise that we’re losing will inevitably switch sides, as if their win/loss ratio was an insurance policy for future procreation. I can honestly say that a good portion of my chat log is “Teams are unbalanced. Auto balancing in 3!…2!…1!”

Also, let’s not forget the hackers that are appearing in more and more servers. It’s amazing what some of these hacks can do, but it’s never a good time when you’re on the receiving end. This situation will get better later rather than sooner.

4. Communication in Asian servers leaves a bit to be desired.

Whoda thought that not having built-in voice chat in a team-based game would suck? I’ve heard of wondrous servers overseas where there’s TeamSpeak integration and everyone is racking up 5-figure scores because they actually know what their role is and what everyone else is doing. I’m sure there’s something similar in Asia region servers, but I figure it’ll be some kind of terrible gaming nerd Babel where no one knows what the fuck anyone else is actually saying.

“YA SHIPUL KESEKI AIISH”
“DIU LEI GOR SEI YUN MAENG”
“I DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU JUST SAID BUT WE’RE FUCKING LOSING, GENTLEMEN”

That’s kinda what happens in text chat right now. No one actually has anything meaningful to say about objectives or status updates. All it is is some guy spouting off some Thai or Indonesian, or someone talking shit in really broken English. (“you bad tank go tkae driver lesson la”)

5. I just plain suck. (OR DO I)

Okay, I can’t be too quick to pass the blame. My skills are more than rusty. I’m as useful with a sniper rifle as I’m am with an Arabic dictionary. Most of the time enemies get the jump on me, and I can tick off no more than half of one’s health. I tend to whiff my knife kills, cutting their flak jackets into pretty ribbons while they open up on my pasty ass. The times I can flank are rare (but satisfying). My accuracy is pretty horrid, and my K/D ratio is less than optimal. I also have next to no freakin’ clue when it comes to aircraft.

However, I’ve been getting better at playing the fucking objective. I learned to let go of that tantalisingly marked enemy in the distance and focus on capturing this point. I still worry about fucking up my K/D ratio but it doesn’t stop me making a move on arming / disarming those MCOMs, or backing up teammates who are capturing an objective.

Ironically enough, after finishing the bulk of this article I had some of the best matches I’ve played since purchasing the game – several unlocks, numerous ribbons, some great kills and my first MVP.

So what was different, exactly?

PTFO, or GTFO.

I would say that the first difference was the total disregard for my own well being. That’s not to say that I ran blindly into enemy fire whirling a cowboy hat over my head. I simply played aggressively and to the situation. If there was a vehicle, I would commandeer it, wait for anyone running up, and engage methodically. If there was a push, I’d support it with ammo or health and pick off stragglers. If there was a choke point, I’d flank and flush out with grenades and suppressive or silenced fire, or take out buildings with RPGs. It was acting in response to the situation, as opposed to grinding on with the same class.

I believe that’s key to winning games – reacting to the situation. Be the recon and use your tools to spot and remote spawn if you can’t see any red blips on your minimap. Be the Support guy if your team is full of engies trying to take out tanks. Divert from the norm, and you change up at least a fraction of what the enemy will expect.

I'm 41 years old.

Bastion is an interesting product. Its price point is highly competitive for what is on offer – strong narration; simple, effective gameplay; and some truly beautiful art direction. It’s a great little distraction that will make waiting for the next AAA release that much shorter.

The story of Bastion is as much unknown to the protagonist as it is to the player – a boy soldier wakes up to a destroyed world caused by an apocalyptic event known as the Calamity. After finding a sanctuary known as the Bastion, the boy aims to find as many survivors as he can and complete the construction of the Bastion using items in the game’s world.

One thing that is immediately apparent about Bastion is its presentation. Bright, vibrant colour palettes and interesting character design are prevalent; both are a little reminiscent of Braid and a welcome change from the brown and beige sand dunes of modern day shooters. The quasi-Japanese style of big eyes and androgynous-looking characters gives the impression of a Japanese artist’s hand at work, and it adds a sense of other-worldliness that few other games can match.

The world of Bastion is brief, yet it belies a sense of depth that drips snippets of insight and information into the world. A velvet-voiced narrator with a subtle Southern drawl tells of various factions and groups, of conflicts and wars between different races. Settings are nicely varied and are literally constructed on the fly – paths are not immediately apparent until one walks in its general direction. Levels are short and brief, which can dull the experience, but it’s an alternative to constant quicksaves or slogging to the next checkpoint.

Steampunk technology and sorcery combine to offer to variety of items and weapons. Simple weapons such as sledgehammers and pikes complement more intricate tools such as the Fang Repeater and the Galleon Mortar, which are all upgradeable and have their own special abilities. Ales and wines offer persistent buffs to boost combat effectiveness. Certain idols can be activated to provide more challenging combat (and subsequently a higher XP and currency payback). The customisation and variation is not endlessly deep – this is not Skyrim – but there is enough variation to address most playing styles, and possibly even encourage replay.

The only real drawback I found with the game was the controls – using ranged weapons such as the Fang Repeater required me to aim slightly off-target when using the mouse, as opposed to auto-aiming with a controller. Contrarily, attempting to aim a weapon with precision using an analogue stick is far less accurate than pinpointing a target with the mouse and leading as necessary.

Bastion is excellent value for money if you need to kill some time between releases. It’s visually appealing and fun to play if you’re not looking for anything too deep or engaging. Well worth the asking price, especially if it’s on sale.

(Also, I’m pretty sure the game’s narrator can impregnate women with his voice.)

Honey, I'm home.

Yeah, yeah. It’s been out for a while, but better late than never, I figure.

Click the image or click here to check it out.

One thing I liked about Metal Gear Solid 4 was the PMC conflicts. Rather than maintain free standing armies, countries would simply employ the services of these companies and have them wage war on their behalf. Konami decided to take this one step further and make it into what I think is a pretty badass game.

This is Metal Gear Arcade. The unit is a booth about the size of an arcade racer, with speakers located behind and in front for a surround-sound(ish) experience.

Yep, that’s 3D-support you see there. It doesn’t look great for me through glasses, so I opt for 2D instead. It also employs head tracking, so you can either turn using the gun, or by looking left and right.

The gun. Firing rate, reload, grenades, movement and weapon selection are all controlled on the one unit.

The game can support pick up play, where you can train against bots and complete objective missions a couple of times for a couple hundred Yen. If you want to progress a character, you’ll need a Konami Amusement Pass to record your details. Presumably you’re also allowed to matchmake with other players around the country, join in events, complete Achievements and so on.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like it’s very popular (despite the very obvious costs that have gone into creating something like this). It’s a shame because it looks rather interesting. I’d say that either the game is too expensive for the experience (which is weird because Gundam: BotB is still going gangbusters, and that shit ain’t cheap) or it’s just not doing that well in Hokkaido. Maybe it’s doing better elsewhere in the country?

Wait, what? You’re telling me that there is a fighting game that features characters from romance mangas, and the aim of the game is to use one schoolgirl to beat the ever-loving shit out of another schoolgirl?

Where has this been all my life?

Aqua Pazza is just that – pairs of schoolgirls battle it out in random locales, where one schoolgirl does the actual biffing and the other simply acts as a support character that appears on screen to either charge the opponent, elbow drop from above, or induce violent otaku nosebleeds. The fighting system, as with most Japanese fighting games, looks rather solid, and there are plenty of opportunities to show how well you can throw them ‘bows (even if most of the attacks consist of awkward bent-arm slaps or kicks that are juuust not quite high enough to get a good panty shot).

The above footage was of an actual player (he was using the tall chick wearing the dark blazer). He initially looked over at me as if to say, “You wanna step up, scrub?” but then he saw that I was filming and quickly looked away. Even the mightiest of warriors can be camera shy.

I'm a zombie in a straight jacket. It's a culture, not a costume.

(Reviewed for PC)

I don’t think I’m alone when I say that I’m getting a little sick (zing!) of zombie games. Granted, most of these games simply use zombies as a means to enhance solid underlying gameplay (Left 4 Dead, Plants vs. Zombies, Dead Rising). But the amount of media portraying risen corpses has overwhelmed me. The intrigue is lost. I’ve been desensitised to the heaving lurch and raspy snarl of the walking dead, and I no longer panic whenever they come within striking distance. I think that humanity is doomed once the zombie plague hits, because everyone will be far too apathetic by that point. Either that, or there will be several merry bands of calm and competent survivors come the zombie apocalypse, thanks to the extensive subliminal training provided by the entertainment industry.

Regardless, all of this didn’t stop me from purchasing Dead Island. Yes, I too was wooed by that emotional and heartfelt trailer that promised gritty storytelling and emotional connection with characters. I thought that this would be the one game that would attempt to focus on the people, rather than the zombies. “We are the real monsters,” etc.

The game has you take on one of four personas – a washed-up former football champion, a jaded Aboriginal ex-cop turned bodyguard, an Asian hotel employee, and a one-hit wonder rap star. They all have their own tortured pasts, but it doesn’t appear to have any bearing on how the game actually pans out other than their preferred method of killing zombies (throwing weapons, sharp weapons, blunt weapons and firearms). It does warrant a couple more playthroughs if only to take advantage of the new perks.

However, the game doesn’t make the proposition very convincing. It appears that patch 1.3 has improved the game somewhat, fixing things like levitating zombies and fickle inventory, but there are still some nagging bugs present. Vehicles handle terribly and get stuck on scenery. Objects have bizarre physics properties – I recall attempting to kick a beachball that behaved like it was filled with lead, and I actually died because I managed to crush myself between it and a wooden fence. When molotovs explode in mid-air, the fire spreads out horizontally on an invisible floor. The dynamic pathfinding chooses some rather interesting routes for me to go through. If I go exploring, sometimes I’ll enter areas that I can no longer leave, forcing me to reload my save game.

Reloading saves would normally be okay, but the save system is awful. As of 1.3, saving persists your inventory, cash, and weapon loadout, but other things like your present location and even your quest objectives do not appear to save correctly. One particular side quest failed to recognise that I collected some flares in my previous session, and I had to backtrack to a zombie-infested arena and redo the quest. Maybe your experience may vary, but I’m getting no love. Checkpoints feel few and far between, but at least it saves every time you quit your session.

The story progression is disappointing. So far, I’ve been doing fetch quest after fetch quest, driving from one end of the map to the other, collecting items, finding people, and returning to the quest giver. It’s a grind, and it feels like it’s justifying this by adding zombies in between. The dialogue is infuriating, as well; everyone is so pathetic and helpless, heaping responsibility upon you because you happen to be immune to infection. Dead Rising was set in a shopping mall, and even those characters had more charisma and lasting appeal. Drop in co-op is also available, which makes the whole fetch-questing mechanic a little more bearable (because misery loves company), but the few public games I’ve come across were griefers that spammed molotovs.

The game’s saving grace is the combat. Dead Island uses a system that allows you to target various parts of the body, so you can break limbs and crush skulls. Cutting off arms with a machete is as fun as throwing diving knives into faces and popping heads with a monkey wrench. (It’s hilarious to see a zombie try and hit you with two broken arms, flailing them uselessly at you.) Weapons can be upgraded and repaired, and they also come with ridiculous names like “Tiring Military Machete” and “Slaughtering Baseball Bat”. The variety of enemies is enough to keep you on edge, and it’s fairly satisfying to muscle and manoeuvre your way out of a hairy situation. However, excellent combat is not enough to brace everything else that’s shaky about this game.

Techland probably had good intentions for this game a long time ago, but the whole affair is fatiguing. The inherent problems don’t surface much later until you’re several hours deep into the game, and even though the issues may be small, they gradually build up until they break the proverbial camel’s back. The fun aspects are so poorly supported by everything else that it struggles to hold its own against other titles this season. It’s one more reason that I’m willing to see the zombie fad slide.

I came across some nostalgic hardware in there:

I also saw a WonderSwan and a Neo Geo Pocket. They’re pretty reasonably priced, too. Must. Not. Submit.