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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 20/10/09 in Videos, and tagged with battle report, Blizzard, expert, Gameplay, Starcraft 2, video.
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Given budgetary woes and climate change angst, Need for Speed: SHIFT is probably the closest I’ll ever get to piloting a real car, and for that the pedestrian world should breathe a heartfelt sigh of relief. If anything, Slightly Mad’s sleek, supple reinvention of the clapped-out franchise has tipped me even further the other way.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 19/10/09 in Reviews, and tagged with ea, Need for Speed: SHIFT, PS3, Slightly Mad Studios, Xbox 360.
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The fifth and final part of Kristan’s epic retrospective.

2006 was, to say the least, a strange year for the FPS, with Microsoft’s determination to get the jump on its rivals in the next generation leaving the market in a state of flux. The highly successful release of the Xbox 360 the previous December had brought development of Xbox 1 titles to a grinding halt, with most publishers flocking to the upscaled Promised Land of next generation gaming.

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Posted by Kristan Reed on in Features, FPS Gamer, and tagged with everything, feature, fps, Half-Life 2, history, kristan reed.
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The history of the Metroid Prime series is well documented. From a shaky start in an unfamiliar genre, Nintendo’s faith in Retro Studios proved to be well founded as the GameCube original went on to be one of the few system-sellers on the troubled format. Gathering together Metroid Prime, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes and Metroid Prime 3: Corruption may seem like a cynical marketing move, but when you multiply the number of folks who missed out the first time around by the huge number of Wii owners in need of substantial gaming experience – well, you can probably guess which way the figures point.

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Posted by Rupert Higham on in Reviews, and tagged with metroid, metroid prime, nintendo, wii.
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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Cheats & Strategies, and tagged with awesome, Broken Glass Studios, Doom 3, id Software, Looking Glass Studios, mod, PC, Thief.
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Uncharted 2, Alfred Hitchcock remix.

I’ve tried creating an Uncharted 2 machinima. The results were (to me at least) highly amusing. I’ll try again when they unlock my PSN account. In the meantime, why not run your eyes over the following threesome.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 18/10/09 in Videos, and tagged with Fan-Made, machinima, PlayStation 3, PS3, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, video.
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Speaking to VideoGamesDaily at a recent preview event, Assassin’s Creed 2 game director Benoit Lambert has revealed that Ubisoft’s 15th century action-adventure will contain 5-7 hours of “Batman-like” gameplay.

Lambert criticised Rocksteady Studio’s warmly received Batman: Arkham Asylum for want of originality – “it’s a game with mechanics you know about, that you’ve already experienced in other games” – but admitted that there were similarities between the projects.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in News, and tagged with action, adventure, Assassin's Creed 2, Batman: Arkham Asylum, Benoit Lambert, News, PS3, Rocksteady Studios, third-person, Ubisoft Montreal.
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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 17/10/09 in Cheats & Strategies, and tagged with bug, glitch, lol, PlayStation 3, PS3, Uncharted 2, whoops.
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The over-indulgent verdict on Dead Space: Extraction is that it’s Dead Space with all the crap drained off. Aggravatingly backward fixed inventories are out, as are tiresome modular upgrades systems. You won’t be carting lots of precious semiconductors, depleted weapons and oxygen cylinders between Stores, as there’s no longer an in-game economy, or back-tracking across cavernous starship interiors, as the action’s now on rails, or, indeed, bothering to do anything other than point and shoot.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Reviews, and tagged with dead space, dead space extraction, ea, wii.
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Sometimes you just can’t be arsed reading through a “proper” preview. If we’re honest, sometimes we can’t be arsed writing the bloody things. The solution in both cases? Cram any and all distracted notebook scribblings into an easy-to-produce, easy-to-read question-and-answer piece. Allow me to introduce FPS Gamer’s wilfully oddball Quickfire Q&A feature.

First up for the Quickfire treatment is Infinity Ward’s Modern Warfare 2. Not long ago we spent an enjoyable hour with the single and multiplayer modes. Hit the jump for details of scopes, sex aids and Special Ops.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 15/10/09 in FPS Gamer, Previews, and tagged with Call of Duty, hands-on, Modern Warfare 2, multiplayer, PlayStation 3, preview, PS3, Q&A, Xbox 360.
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The fourth part of Kristan’s epic retrospective.

2001 was a real turning point in the evolution of the FPS, with major developers starting to devote serious attention to consoles for the first time.

While most publishers and developers were content to commission console ports of successful PC titles, others bucked the trend by debuting titles on the new wave of living room hardware. Volition’s Red Faction hit PS2 to sizeable critical and commercial success in May of 2001, fully four months ahead of the PC version – a release pattern PC gamers would have to get used to.

Microsoft went even further than THQ when it bought Bungie Studios and made Halo: Combat Evolved exclusive to Xbox, prompting massive outcry among desktop shooter enthusiasts.

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Posted by Kristan Reed on 13/10/09 in Features, FPS Gamer, and tagged with feature, first-person shooter, fps, history, kristan reed.
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For the past 14 years, tiny Japanese developers Cave have been the biggest thing in 2D shooting games or shmups as they’re know among the syllable-impaired, or simply STGs in Japan. Despite resolutely focusing on one waning genre, Cave have carved a niche for themselves that commands an incredibly hardcore following, and while other developers such as Raizing and Psikyo have succumbed to the difficulties of the modern Japanese games market, Cave are still going strong with at least two arcade releases a year, and more recently, some very healthy Xbox 360 ports. 

A princess, a dragon and a morbidly obese jewel-incrusted mad woman. What's not to love?

Having previously licensed only two arcade games for release outside of Japan over ten years ago, western fans could be forgiven for thinking that Cave had no interest in the outside world, though at this year’s Tokyo Game Show, they had a message for potential importers of their forthcoming Xbox 360 title, Mushihimesama Futari (or Insect Princess), that will bring a smile to the faces of bullet hell masochists everywhere. As a trial, Cave are making Futari completely region-free, meaning anybody with the means of importing a copy can play it on their console. 

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Posted by Rupert Higham on 09/10/09 in Japan, and tagged with Cave, Mushihimesama, shmup, Xbox 360.
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The third part of Kristan’s epic retrospective.

1998 proved to be a watershed year for the First Person Shooter, with several present-day heavyweights making their hugely impressive debuts and bringing about a genre-wide shift in power.

The release of Epic Games’ long-awaited Unreal on PC in May of that year dovetailed perfectly with the emergence of 3Dfx’s awesome Voodoo 2 3D accelerator. Suddenly PC gamers (with deep pockets) were being treated to the kind of super-smooth, high resolution visuals that rivalled anything the arcade could offer at the time.

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Posted by Kristan Reed on 08/10/09 in Features, FPS Gamer, and tagged with Counter Strike, Epic Games, feature, fps, Half-Life, history, id Software, kristan reed, Quake, Unreal, valve.
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In the early nineties Capcom made it their business to make endless incremental updates to their flagship Street Fighter franchise. This practice led to the outlawing of “Hyper Super Street Fighter II EX Plus Alpha Turbo Dash Championship Edition Double Upper” jokes in the world of video game journalism. They have since calmed down (or possibly run out of hyperbolic words in the English language), giving the revision of their wildly successful Street Fighter IV come-back title just one very suitable prefix – Super Street Fighter IV.

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Posted by Rupert Higham on 07/10/09 in Previews, Spotlight, and tagged with Capcom, PS3, Street Fighter, Xbox 360.
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15th century Venice’s rooftops were considerably more populous than those of 12th century Jerusalem, by Ubisoft Montreal’s estimate at least. The bowmen pacing from one cornice to another are old news, perhaps, but there are now gaggles of lowlifes squatting round sodden camp-fires in among the turrets. I interrupt my progress along the skyline to give one particular trio a closer inspection. A mugshot pops up in bottom-left as I near, and a tap of start button opens the relevant entry in Assassin’s Creed 2‘s comprehensive database, adrift on a sea of silvery digital pretence.

The lowlifes are thieves – agile, discreet and very receptive to the jingle of ready cash in reasonable quantities. I decide to give this band some work. A tap of Y transfers a handful of coins instantaneously to their pockets (beats internet banking, doesn’t it?), and the three men fall in dutifully behind.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Previews, Spotlight, and tagged with action, Assassin's Creed 2, PlayStation 3, preview, PS3, Ubisoft Montreal, Xbox 360.
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The PlayStation is one of the most recognisable brands in video game history and the FPS is arguably the most popular genre of modern gaming. How can it be then, that fifteen years of PlayStation hardware hasn’t produced an exclusive system-selling FPS title? Sure, we’ve had the likes of SOCOM, Killzone and Resistance but where is Sony’s Goldeneye, Half-life, Halo or Gears of War? Zipper Interactive are hoping to answer just that question.

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Posted by Rupert Higham on in FPS Gamer, Previews, and tagged with MAG, PS3, Zipper Interactive.
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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 05/10/09 in Cheats & Strategies, and tagged with expert, exploit, Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, PlayStation 3, pointless, PS3, stylish, Tecmo, Xbox 360, YouTube.
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Rachel borrows some threads from the Dynasty Warriors crew.

Ninja Gaiden 2 was a real ball-breaker. Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 is slightly less of a ball-breaker, mainly because the camera system has been slipped a few espressos, but still ridiculously tricky. And that, my friends, is what makes it Ninja Gaiden.

Passing on gameplay tips would be a crime against our medium’s increasingly scant reservoirs of trouser-soiling difficulty. If you’re after an easy life, go tuck into Mini Ninjas. Here are a few pointers on the subject of character unlockables instead.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Cheats & Strategies, and tagged with costumes, Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, PlayStation 3, PS3, Tecmo.
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The second part of Kristan’s epic retrospective.

By the middle of the 1990s, the first person shooter genre had given rise to a full-scale gaming revolution. With fluid 3D engines inspiring developers to stunning feats of innovation, the genre helped spark off a software and hardware race that continues to this day.

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Posted by Kristan Reed on 03/10/09 in Features, FPS Gamer, and tagged with Duke Nukem 3D, educational, fps, GoldenEye, history, Quake.
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Whilst it hasn’t generated the buzz of LittleBigPlanet, or the barrage of impressive statistics that filled the Spore universe, Halo 3 can still hold its own as a champion of user-generated multiplayer content. As we’ve seen with other titles, however, the more popular and accessible your creative toolset, the less easy it is to filter out the dross. Bungie’s community files section, though a fantastic tool in the past, is struggling under the weight.

So that’s where the following list comes in. This is by no means an exhaustive guide to the very best that Forge has to offer, but we’ve compiled from long experience, cherry-picking the maps and game variants that have earned a permanent spot in the FPSG multiplayer hopper. It’s a connoisseur’s selection of carnage. And so, without further ado…

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Posted by Kikizo Staff on 02/10/09 in Features, FPS Gamer, and tagged with best of, bungie, first-person shooter, Forge, fps, Halo 3, user-created content.
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When Bungie invited us to “finish the fight” back in the winter of 2007, only a madman would have believed that we had seen the last of the Covenant. You simply don’t take the biggest triple A single-format series of the decade outback and shoot the cash-cow in the head. Tasking itself with creating a follow-up to “the biggest entertainment launch of all time” Bungie have sidestepped a full-blown sequel along with the weighty expectations and budgetary requirements that come with it, instead focusing on a leaner, more focused view of Halo’s grand narrative.

As the title implies, this is an expansion of Halo 3, and as such the focus will be on the new. There can be very few Xbox 360 owners who aren’t intimately familiar with Master Chief’s antics, but the titular ODSTs (Orbital Drop Shock Troopers or Helljumpers to give them their punchier nick-name) have been given little screen time in the Halo series so far. What do they bring to the table?

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Posted by Rupert Higham on 01/10/09 in Reviews, and tagged with bungie, halo, halo 3 odst, master chief.
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Assassin’s Creed was a frustrating beast, equal parts brilliance and tedium. It loaded our tables with steeples and pennants, astonishingly lifelike NPC throngs and infinitely exploitable parkour playgrounds – but that love of the bigger picture was also its worst enemy, leaving Ubisoft Montreal precious little time and resources to blow on crucial questions of mission structure and variety. The game needed, demanded a sequel, a chance to capitalise on its own ambition. Fortunately, it shifted more than enough copies to warrant one.

Benoit Lambert is Game Director on Assassin’s Creed 2, which transits the action from the Crusades era to Renaissance Italy. He was unlucky enough to bump into us at a hotel bar recently. Insolent questions and heated answers after the cut.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 30/09/09 in Interviews, Spotlight, and tagged with Assassin's Creed 2, Benoit Lambert, interview, PlayStation 3, PS3, Ubisoft Montreal, Xbox 360.
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Charlie B... more

Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Videos, and tagged with BBC, Charlie Brooker, comedy, Gameswipe, iPlayer, mainstream.
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In some ways Mini Ninjas is a step back for IO Interactive. That’s likely to be your first impression, at least, if you’re fond of the uneven but intricate machinations of the Hitman series, or even the wannabe badassedness of Kane and Lynch. Peel away the smooth, vivid flourishes of the artwork and the Danish developer’s latest seems irredeemably old hat: placid running and jumping married to cute melee mash-fests, half a dozen playable characters (ranged, heavy, quick, etc), a dab of stealth, health potions, magic and QTE-laden boss fights.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 29/09/09 in Reviews, and tagged with action, adventure, Mini Ninjas, PS3, review, Xbox 360, Zipper Interactive.
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Halo-jumping: officially the campest thing you can do while holding a gun.

Oh Don’t Stop Trying? Owl Dysentry Stifles Trust? Old Dogs Shoot True? Who knows (Wikipedia, that’s who), but here are some Achievements to divert you while you scratch your head.

All Ears (30) Find 15 Audio Logs, alone or with another ODST.
Audiophile (75) Find all Audio Logs, alone or with another ODST.
Be Like Marty (10) In Firefight, finish a full round without killing a single enemy.
Boom, Headshot (5) Get 10 automag headshot kills in any level.
Both Tubes (5) Get 10 Rocket kills on Kizingo Boulevard.
Campaign Complete: Heroic (100) Complete the Campaign on Heroic difficulty.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Cheats & Strategies, and tagged with Achievements, fps, Gamer Points, halo 3 odst, Xbox 360.
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Kristan’s epic retrospective leaves the starting blocks.

Casting back to the origins of the First Person Shooter, it’d be easy to recount id Software’s seminal achievements in the early 1990s, shout about Wolfenstein 3D and Doom, and completely disregard all the effort and experimentation that preceded them.

For the very first examples of first-person shooting, you have to go right back to 1974 – an era when most people were only just getting their first taste of videogaming via Spacewar and Pong, and the idea of owning your own computer or gaming console was a distant dream.

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Posted by Kristan Reed on in Features, FPS Gamer, and tagged with feature, first-person shooter, fps, genre, history, kristan reed.
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The new ... more

Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 28/09/09 in Videos, and tagged with FFXIII, Final Fantasy XIII, gorgeous, JRPG, melodrama, Square, Tokyo Game Show, trailer.
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TodayR... more

Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 24/09/09 in Videos, and tagged with Metal Gear, Metal Gear Solid, MGS, Peace Walker, PSP, TGS, Tokyo Game Show, trailer.
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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Videos, and tagged with awesome, Fumito Ueda, Team ICO, TGS, The Last Guardian, Tokyo Game Show, trailer.
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Halo 3: ODST‘s out, and the consensus so far is that the pudding’s chock-full of proof. And space marines. Space marines in hideously awesome single-seater orbital insertion pods, raining down all over the Covenant-riddled burg of New Mombasa like droplets from God’s Almighty wang.

The “crash-landing into a fight” sequence is pretty well-worn rope. ODST‘s appearance is a good excuse to revisit some timeless examples. Videos after the cut.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 23/09/09 in Features, FPS Gamer, Videos, and tagged with fps, halo 3 odst, intro, rough landings, round-up, video.
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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Videos, and tagged with DS, hide and seek, PC, trailer, Where's Waldo, wii.
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There’s some Planet of the Apes-level irony behind the bumper-to-bumper release of Motorstorm: Arctic Edge and the long-awaited PSP version of Gran Turismo. It’s like Kanye West sharing a microphone with Susan Boyle: on the one hand, the elderly epitome of automotive realism, swaddled in manufacturer logos; on the other, a racer whose idea of subtlety is seeing the paint flake when your skidding back-end haymakers some poor sap into a gorge.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 21/09/09 in Reviews, and tagged with BigBig Studios, Evolution Studios, Motorstorm: Arctic Edge, PSP, racing, review, Sony.
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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Spotlight, and tagged with artwork, ea, photo, Rock Band, The Beatles, unlockable, Xbox 360.
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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Cheats & Strategies, and tagged with Achievements, Need for Speed: SHIFT, racing, unlockable, Xbox 360.
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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 17/09/09 in News, Videos, and tagged with boobs, breast physics, lol, Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, Sixaxis, Team Ninja, Tecmo.
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They don’t get any truer to subject matter than this. In its technical prowess, trim structure, fierce but fiercely contained bursts of freeform violence and continual teetering on the edge of psychological horror, Rocksteady Studios’ spectacular second project is a mirror for the Dark Knight himself – lean, unhurried, purposeful, potent and just the slightest bit chaotic. Quite how the minds behind the savagely passable Urban Chaos: Riot Response managed to produce an action-adventure as expertly judged, as substantial as Arkham Asylum defeats me, but DC Comics enthusiasts finally have the videogame Batman they’ve been waiting for.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Reviews, and tagged with action, Batman: Arkham Asylum, DC Comics, Eidos, review, Rocksteady Studios, third-person.
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It’s 6am, and tempers are fraying. We’ve had a long night, but the eighth (and perhaps finest) level of the Halo 3 co-op campaign – The Covenant – has our four-man party clamouring to recall stories of Silent Cartographer, the crowning glory of Halo: CE.

It’s a sharp reminder of a long-forgotten gameplay rush, a level beloved for green rolling hills and the most prominent of free-form AI hooks on which Bungie hangs its celebrated set pieces. This was the simultaneously nostalgic and progressive experience we were all seeking. This, we declared to one another, was what console shooters were all about.

Posted by Kikizo Staff on 16/09/09 in Features, FPS Gamer, and tagged with bad design, Boiling Point, fps, Half-Life 2, Halo 3, Haze, vehicle sections.
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Like collecting cars? You’ll like Gran Turismo. Really like collecting cars? You’ll like Gran Turismo. Like driving ‘em too? You’ll like Gran Turismo. Like luxuriously upholstered backdrops, a sense of kinetic feedback, canny competitors and an online community? You’ll like… Oh.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 15/09/09 in Reviews, and tagged with .
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How about a screenshot fusillade? Brink, you may recall, was one of the more intriguing new shooters at this year’s E3. It’s quick on its feet like Mirrors Edge, but handy with a gun like Quake. Enemy Territory developers Splash Damage are doing the honours.

There’s a teaser trailer over at the official site, and its contents are thus: big tower called “The Ark”, old chap with blood running down his face. We know what to do with big towers: get to the top of them, fight something, blow everything up.

Men with really small heads after the jump.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Features, and tagged with Bethesda, Brink, Enemy Territory, fps, Mirrors Edge, Quake, screenshots, Splash Damage, Zenimax.
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Activisio... more

Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 14/09/09 in News, Videos, and tagged with Activision, Daft Punk, DJ Hero, music game, Queen, Scratch: The Ultimate DJ.
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According... more

Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 10/09/09 in Videos, and tagged with Demon Souls, ex-employees, fantasy, hard, PS3, trailer.
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This one&... more

Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 09/09/09 in Videos, and tagged with comedy, lol, Mario, spoof.
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My fellow... more

Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on in Videos, and tagged with 2D, Arcade, awesome, combos, Darwin, fighting, King of Fighters XII, SNK Playmore.
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You couldn’t ask for a more appropriate candidate than Wolfenstein for first videogamesdaily review ever (cue flying champagne cork). The Wolfenstein series was to the emergence of our favourite genre what certain apples are to the Book of Genesis, for starters, and this iteration comes care of Raven Software, the venerable gun-cradlers behind such classic shooters as HeXen, Soldier of Fortune and Jedi Knight II.

Most importantly of all, though, returning frontman ‘B.J.’ Blazkowicz has to be one of the butt-ugliest bundles of polygons ever rendered. What better way to reinforce your love for the first person viewpoint than lacing yourself into the boots of Daniel Baldwin’s reptilian half-brother? If this were a third-person game, I’d have phoned an exorcist halfway through the tutorial mission.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 08/09/09 in Reviews, and tagged with .
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Say hello to my little friends. All 256 of 'em.

SCEE just paradropped a new MAG trailer into our mailboxes. Besides some tremendous splosions and stirring montages of people glaring down gunsights at one another, the trailer is notable for being scripted (though not voiced) by readers of the PlayStation Blog.

Presumably scriptwriters were the first to go when the corporation started cutting jobs last Christmas. More plus video after the jump.

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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 04/09/09 in FPS Gamer, News, and tagged with fps, MAG, PlayStation Blog, SCEE, script, Sony, writers, Zipper Interactive.
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Posted by Edwin Evans-Thirlwell on 02/09/09 in FPS Gamer, News, and tagged with fps, PC, Section 8, Timegate Studios, trailers, Tribes, Xbox 360.
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