Super Mario Galaxy

So I finally got around to buying and playing SMG (Mario Galaxy), even though I was a bit weary of how this new gameplay was done. However, after playing and completing the game, I can say that I really enjoyed it.

Even though the Wii is not as powerful as the 360 or PS3, Nintendo has taken what they have and made SMG look lovely, all the way down to the minor characters too. Peach is rarely seen but her model looks just as detailed, well as detailed as Ninty's Mario cartoon style is, as Mario or Bowser. The same goes for the "planets" that Mario goes to, I use the word planets losely as some times they are rather small, and have a few holes in them.

Gameplay wise its just as amazing as playing Super Mario 64, although I prefer the content of SM64 to that of SMG. All of Mario's jumps are there from the 64 game too, his triple jump, wall jump, long jump, his crouch flip, and lastly the jump you can do when you quickly change direction when running.

Now some of the power ups could have been better, we seen a reintroduction to the awesome Fire Flower, and we also see its cousin the Ice Flower which lets you walk on water, as it turns to ice as you run accross it.
Other power ups take the form of power Mushrooms, we have a mushroom that doubles your life, but only for that level. Then we have the Bee, and the Boo Mushroom.
Yes thats right I said bee, when you get the Bee Mushroom, Mario gets a Bee suit, he can fly for a short time before tiring and can stick to Bee things like honey. However if you touch and water he loses the suit.
The Boo 'shroom is quite similar, you can "float" along, and can go transparent to go through walls (but not all walls), just as Boos dont like light, if you go into a light as a Boo it will cancel and you lose it.
Now possibly the wierdest power up is the Spring 'shroom, when you see it, it looks like a metal Mushroom. I was kinda hoping that it was similar to the Metal Cap from the 64 game but no. With this powerup you get a metal spring wraped around Mario, and you can spring jump, which makes you jump really high. Although you dont see it that much in the game.
Anoyingly all power ups wont last forever, the Fire and Ice flower run out rather quickly, the Boo, Bee and Spring, will run out just they take a while to do so.

Boss battles are almost always on a small round planet, and they usually take about 3-4 hits to defeat them, just like the old Sonic games. Each boss is unique, apart from the sometimes recuring Bowser fights, altho the last time you fight him it is a good fight that last a while.
I found some of the other boss a little bit hard, I had to take a few goes at them before I figured out how to defeat them

With most games the thing that lets it down is the camera, and SMG is no different. There are times you wish the camera would just move behind Mario so you could see "wtf" you are doing, but no, when you hit the camera reset button nothing happens and your left to figure out which way to maneuverwhile trying to jump upside down. For the most part the camera will stay behind you, or sometimes the game will go into a classic 2d side scroller, but when it does mess up it is rather anoying.

When I finally finished the game, not getting all 120 stars, I was treated to a rather great ending. I wont spoil anything about the story, if you could call it a story. "Oh noes Peach got kidnapped by Bowser.......Again..." but you'll just have to play it and find out.

Music, now this is really really good in SMG. When you pick up the Ice or Fire flower, I really enjoyed the music, it made me fell like Mario was unstopable while he had the power up. Also when your riding around on a ball the music's speed and loudness is determined by how fast your rolling it. Which kinda makes you wanna roll really fast as the music makes it even more fun.

Over all I give Galaxy 8/10, camera lets it down in places, and some of the levels get a bit samey.

Crysis

I can not remember the date when Crysis was realeased, as I didnt take much notice of it. Mainly because I heard it was a beast of game, that sucks up PC resources. Well I can tell you that is wrong. Even though the game defaulted the settings to medium, Im the gamer that favours gameplay over graphics.

Any way, I noticed that the game had been traded in, where I work. As I get a lovely "staff discount" I thought sod it, and bought it that same evening.

Once it was installed and ready to go, I fired it up. The intro movie is awesome, showing off what one man can do in one of these super suits, it just made me all the more anxious to get stuck in. Now im not new to the FPS (First Person Shooter) genre, so I decided to choose the hard difficulty setting. That is after I had a look at what each difficulty did, like in easy mode you can fire gun turrets on a vehicle from the driver seat and get a "simple" pair of binocular (bugger knows what that means.) Where as on the really hard setting, named Delta for some reason, didnt give you easy mode features and I noticed that it also said "enemies speak Korean", meaning you were fighting the Korean army.

I was amazed at how fast the game loaded the level/map, for such a new game. I didnt have to wait long to get my first glimpse of the lovely graphics. Although set to medium, they are still beautiful and my computer ran than incredible smooth to boot. Plus having a run around the level areas are huge, just like the Crytek team to make it like Far Cry which also had big levels inbetween loading screens.

The first area you see is the inside of a plane, with your captain going over the mission. Seems there was more then one of these super suits as your part of a 5 man team. The mission is a rescue mission, but as we're playing this game we know that something is going to happen, what with all those trailers that were released before the game came out.

The Super Suit grants you several abilities, however at a cost of its energy supply. Max energy is set at 100 right above your health, although when your are not using any suit abilities your energy replenishes itself, infact so does your health. Thats right no first aid / medikits to worry about finding when you're on naff all health.

Abilities include:

• Maxium Armour, when your hit it takes it out of your energy first.
• Speed, you can a slight increase to your speed when walking, and a huge boost when you run, although it eats your energy like there is no tomorrow.
• Strength, it hurts more when you melee, you can jump higher, and also when sniping it steadies your aim more.
• Cloak, thats right, your in a jungle and you have a cloak, Predator any one. Anyway energy consumed depends on how you move, and if you're motionless it goes down very slowly.

Another really cool feature in Crysis, is the weapon mod system. You can get different sights, "tactical" parts like a grenade laucher, laser sights and more. Needless to say whenever I have any rifle I stick a silencer, laser sight, and a scope on it, much more easy to pass through an area after you've sniped every one in the head.

The A.I. for Crysis does not let the game down either, when ever I start sniping someone and miss, they know Im trying to shoot them they duck and dodge their way to cover. Sometimes they ever stay there if I have hit them a few times.

Now you can never have a game that you liked all of, there is always something that anoys you, and makes you want to break something. Well for me its the enemy choopers, not only do they know where I am even if im hiding in the bushes, they can only be taken down with 2 sucessful rocket hits. However dont let this discourge you, as when you die, as Ive said before the loading times are quick, even quicker from a save point after you've died. Plus auto saves are done very requlary through out the game.

I have yet to complete Crysis, but its one of the game stories where you want to find out what happens next. I have not tried the multiplayer yet, as I want to play through the single player first, Im also curious to how it is done.

Personally I give Crysis a 9/10 and deffinatly worth the £30 price tag for a new copy.

The Eye of Judgment

Eye of Judgment is only availible on the Playstation 3.

Eye of Judgment (EoJ) is a game the uses the Playstation Eye camera, and cards to make a whole new kind of card game experiance. Offical Site

I have always been a fan of CCGs (Collectable Card Games), and had contemplated buy this game for some time, what with a £59.99 price tag.
It wasnt until people I know came in to the shop where I work and was talking about it, one of which wanted to buy the only one left at work. So have the reason of me buying it was just to spite him :p

Now when I think back, I wish I had bought it sonner. As Ive said I love card games and this one is no exception. The first thing you see when you open the box is the Playstation 3s Eye Toy (official name - Playstation Eye) which at first glance looks like its got a deformed forhead. How ever this is just its microphone, thats right camera and microphone (just like a normal cam corder).

Anyway the rest of the contents are as follow:

• 1 Playmat
• 1 Camera Stand (in parts)
• 1 Starter Deck
• 1 Booster Pack
• The Game "Eye of Judgment"

Once set up for the first time, you need to align the camera up with the mat, easily done. I just couldnt wait to see this game in action, unfortunatly there is no single player story mode, although I have no idea how you would do that for this game :p

Now the game is played on a 3 by 3 square grid, so that it gives you 9 squares in total (also refered as fields in the game). The object of the game is to get creatures / characters on the board so that you occupy 5 of the squares. You can also win when your opponent can not draw any more cards.

Now I wont go into detail about all the creature abilities, field types, what happens each turn and such. Just that all combined you have to think of your stratagy and placments of your creatures, as just playing one creature can turn the tide the game even when it looks like your completly owning the opponent.

When playing any card game, you need at least 2 people to play, and if you dont have any friends or a club to go to, it makes playing that game and collecting the cards a waste of time. Even though you can invite a mate around and play against them, what happens when they arent free? Go online, theres hardly any waiting to get into a game.

Just one word of advice to anyone thinking of getting this game, the matches last a long time, even with a limit for your turn. Then again what CCG match doesnt take a long time.

Burnout Paradise

Today was the launch of the newest Burnout game, avalible on PS3 and XB360.

I myself am not a big fan of driving games, especially realistic ones, unless I can some how shoot my opponents.

However, after playing the demo, I came to like this game. Mainly because, it isnt a realistic driving game, and you can just do what you want with this one. I love the free roaming aspect of the game, coupled with the extras of smashing cars, gates, billboards, and other objects.

...anyway bit late, I'll finish this later...

...back again.

I had a taster of the online aspect of Paradise, which starts out as "Freeburn" basically you just cruise around the city doing what you want as usual. Just, another player may drive over and give you a nudge.

When ever you takeout out an opponent online, whether its during freeburn or a race, provided they have a camera (PS3 - Playstation EyE, 360 - Live Vision) you get a mugshot of that person to keep. So if they take you out, they get one of you. With that said, there are a couple of people, german I think, that have a lovly picture of me pulling a face.

During the freeburn at anypoint, the Host, can start a race. Now the thing I did not like when I playing was the fact that the Host chose everyones cars, which to me sucked. Now he did make it fair and make everyone drive the same car, but personally I hated em =/.

Even though I did not enjoy my car being picked for me, I still enjoyed the over all aspect of the online play. So be carefull, you may see me speeding your way.

Getting Started

Right well, I thought I'd start one of these things up.
Mainly just to archive what games I have played and what Ive thought about them.

New Games Currently Playing:
Witcher - PC
The Eye of Judgement - PS3

Old Games Playing:
Counter Strike: Source - PC
Battlefield 2142 - PC

I shall write up more about the games later, when I have more time to spare.