Gears of War 3 – Single Player

Finished the fight, remained Brothers to the end and a hoard of other taglines about shooters. Took 12 hours which is pretty decent length.

Pros

* Gameplay is still as fantastic as before.

* Graphics are gorgeous and not just brown.

* Good enemy variety.

* The bit when Mad World plays

* The menu system contains the motherload of stats which is fantastic for tracking everything in the game.

Cons

* Pacing is a bit off and has a couple of lulls in it.

* On Hardcore it is a hell of a lot easier than the previous games. I hate to think what normal or casual is like.

* Nice to have a ending, but it leaves too many questions left over.

9/10

Rage (Single Player)

RAGE is ID Software's latest shooter. It uses the ID Tech 5 engine to render Mega Textures to look fantastic (not without it's problems though) and maintains a 60 fps rate through the game meaning it runs smooth as a baby's bottom.

Story

Set in a post apocalyptic world where you are an Ark survivor (basically you were buried underground after an asteroid strike). You wake to a world overrun by mutants, destroyed cities and Mad Max style settlers and gangs.

You meet up with John Goodman and immediately start doing tasks for random people and shooting a hell of a lot of mutants.

Gameplay

It is a weird mix of racing, RPG-lite and corridor shooting.

It fakes you with the overworld that it will be a Fallout type RPG, but it's very basic. However these parts are all mainly distractions to do between missions. The vast majority of the game involves driving to a dungeon type level and corridor shooting your way to the objective and back. i.e A typical ID Shooter.

Graphics

The graphics are amazing when you stand still and it maintains a 60 fps at all times meaning it moves very smooth. However when you enter an area and when you turn round fast there is a noticeable lag on the textures meaning they seem to load in a second too slow. It's not a huge problem, but it can be distracting.

The best bit of the graphics is the animations of the enemies and characters. All the AI characters have been individually animated for each bit of audio making them move realistically depending on their speech. The enemies leap, roll and dodge with impressive skill making killing them all the more satisfying.

The bigger bosses are impressive and considering it never drops frame rate it all moves fantastically.

Overall

I was impressed with the game. The shooting is massively enjoyable, with a wide array of weapons that have multiple ammo types meaning that customising the way you like to play is a lot of fun. Personally I liked to go with the Shotgun for mutants as they get close pretty fast, the Authority rifle for all other types of enemies and the wingstick as the alternate fire.

The Wingstick is my favourite toy in the game. It's a glave type throwing device (Think the movie Krull) that spins at an enemy, bouncing off surfaces and decapitating them as they run towards you. It never gets old and just gets better with the advanced model you get later in the game.

While the story is functional and the atmosphere in the game is great. It seriously loses it towards the end making me think that the game was rushed. It has a disappointing last few missions and it felt very rushed. The expected final boss battle never materialised and the game just ended leaving you thinking WTF happened next.

It took me about 12:30 hrs to complete the game and I had a hell of a lot of fun.

8/10

Post edited 09:38 – Nov 29th 2011 by

Assassins Creed Revelations – Xbox 360.

Good :-

Atmospheric graphics, did not notice any glitches but facial animation could be better.

Main story and gameplay still exellent.

Lots to do but most is completely optional.

Fun multiplayer. 

Bad :-

Very similar to brotherhood.

Apart from the excellent simple deathmatch most multiplayer just devolves into mad running around (can be fun but not what I want from AC multiplayer) .

Not going to say anything about the tower defense and desmond sequences as they are almost completely optional and have little bearing on the main game.

On the whole an excellent game but very similar to brotherhood so if brotherhood left you wanting more you should get this but if you're new to the series get the cheaper brotherhood first.

 8.5/10

Tim Schafer's Double Fine's Stacking. Unique Matryoshka Doll puzzler.

You'll love:

It's very stylish.

It's funny.

That you've not really played anything like it before.

You'll hate:

Overlong unskippable cut scenes.

Irritating music.

Can be a bit repetitive.

8/10 – Try the demo!