Greg on Games

Yesterday I got a few games because there was a buy two used games, get one free sale at EB Games. One of the game I got was Stranglehold. Stranglehold is one of the best games ever. It has hours and hours of fun by shooting hundreds of guys.

The campaign seems to go on forever. It is like an extremely long action movie that you get to control. The only thing that sucks about this game is the online. In online it takes tons of shots to kill someone, there is only support for up to 6 players, and it’s impossible to aim.

Stranglehold is just an awesome game, the plot is great, the action is cool, and it has very few flaws.

Even though the Simpsons Game was released slightly after the Simpsons Movie, it has nothing to do with the movie. Instead it makes fun of some video games like Need for Speed, Madden, Grand Theft Auto, and Medal of Honor. In the game you can play as Bart, Homer, Lisa, and sometimes even Maggie. It has 16 levels, and free roam Springfield. It has voice overs for almost any character you can think of.

The Simpsons Game is worth $60 because there is so much gameplay, but I would rent it because it has practically no replay value. I would rent it from Blockbuster just because the game will take you a while to beat, and Blockbuster lets you keep the games for a long time without late fees.

Mesmerize: Distort is a two dollar download from the PS Store that uses the Playstation Eye to create abstract effects on the screen. The effects are Blurmotion, Fallout, Flora, Genepool, and Pincushion. Pincushion is my favorite. It looks like this:

You should buy Mesmerize: Distort if you don’t have anything else for the Playstation Eye, otherwise I wouldn’t get it.

Snakeball is another downloadable game from the PS Store. It is the classic game snake fused with the future. What I like about Snakeball the most besides the actual game, is the online layout. It reminds me of Xbox Live because you can send invites and join a game from an invite with ease.

There is support for up to 4 players split screen, and 10 maps to play on. The way to win is get the most points. You can get points by getting the colorful balls, and whenever you feel that you have enough, or are nervous that someone will shoot you take your balls, you can cash them in for points by either going across the circle in the middle of the map, or throwing the balls into a ball catcher. On some maps there are more than one circle, and you have to match the color of the ball with the color of the circle to get any points.

I think that Snakeball is worth getting because the online is tons of fun, you can play with up to 4 players on the same screen, and it’s just a fun casual game.

I finally decided to buy Stuntman: Ignition yesterday, because it’s only $35 used at EB Games. Even though the demo wasn’t that good, the final product is great. There are tons of levels, 4 player local multiplayer, 8 player online multiplayer, create your own arena to do stunts in, and much more.

The Career mode has six movies to do stunts in, about six different scenes in each movie, random stunts to perform in Odd Jobs, and Rehearsals, which teaches how to do something that will help you get more points in a scene.

There is local, lan, and online multiplayer. The multiplayer modes are backlot battle, backlot race, and stunt tourney. Backlot battle is probably my favorite mode because the opponents battle to get the highest amount of stunt points by ramming each other, and taking risks.

The Constructor is basically an empty arena where you get to fill it with things to do stunts off of. When you start the game, you only have two items in each category, but you can unlock the rest of them by getting four or more stars on each scene in the Career mode.

This game has a lot repetition in it, unless you are really good when you start off playing it. I would rent this rather than buy it, because easy to get bored of from trying to complete each scene perfectly.

Ubisoft chose a interesting approach by pricing Beowulf The Game for PS3 at just $20. I already wanted to buy the game, but when I heard it was only $20, I rushed to EB Games to buy it.

The story mode is almost exactly like the movie. You play as Beowulf, who is a strong monster-slaying Nordic hero called to rid the Danes of a monster (Grendel). After defeating Grendel, you’re given a dragon horn by Danish king, he then tells you to kill Grendel’s mother. I would tell you more, but I wouldn’t want to ruin it for you if you end up buying this game.

The combat system is ok, it could be better. The thing I like the most is going into carnal mode. Carnal mode is when Beowulf goes berserk, and you gain the ability to kill your teammates without knowing it.

Thats about it, a decent game for a great price.

Skate is a truly great game. The graphics are great, and the controls are a ton better than the Tony Hawk games. The controls are like skateboarding. To ollie, you push the right analog stick down, then up, just like you do with your feet on a real skateboard.

In the story mode you start off basically as a nobody. You have to complete pro challenges, photo shoots, and make a skate video. In the story you can compete in the X Games, and if you do good enough you can go pro.

The is party play for up to four players to play local. The two modes are spot battle and S.K.A.T.E. Spot battle is basically horse without letters, and S.K.A.T.E is horse without score.

There is online play for up to 4 players. There are tons of modes: S.K.A.T.E, free skate (which really isn’t a mode, it’s the lobby before the game starts), and racing, just to name a few.

If your a skateboarding fan definitely get this game over picking any of the Tony Hawk games. Good things about this game: cool controls, fun online play, you can save replays of whatever you want and upload them to the skate server or just copy them to your hard drive, and large environment. The bad things about this game: story too short, only two local multiplayer modes, and no local multiplayer free skate.

Remember going to an arcade and playing Ghost Squad? Well now you don’t have too, Ghost Squad is out for the Wii, for $30. Ghost Squad is like Time Crisis just a lot shorter, and much easier to set up at home.

I finished the game in less than a hour and a half. The cool thing is that when you beat it, you want to keep playing it and beating it, because it is hard to beat 100% of each three levels, there is a world leaderboard to compare your score to the world, and each time you beat it, you unlock a new mode, or new costumes. The first time you beat the game you unlock ninja mode. Ninja mode is the same as the regular mode, but you shoot Shurikens (ninja stars) instead of bullets, you have unlimited ammo, and everyone is dressed as a ninja. Once you beat ninja mode you unlock paradise mode.

Ghost Squad is a fun, classic arcade game. It is extremely fun if you own the Wii Zapper. It is definitely worth $30 because if you add up all the money it would take to beat it at the arcade, that’s how much money you’re saving, and don’t forget it comes with extra Wii content.

I got Unreal Tournament 3 for Christmas. I was really looking forward to getting this game because even though I haven’t played any of the other Unreal Tournaments before, I have heard great things about them. The other Unreal Tournaments were praised because they were pushing the bar in graphics, gameplay, and multiplayer. This Unreal Tournament is sort of disappointed because there is no split-screen support, which means if I want to play with local friends that either don’t have a PS3 or don’t have Unreal Tournament 3, I have to have two PS3s and two copies of Unreal Tournament 3 in the same house. That is just too much trouble just to play a game with friends.

The new Unreal Engine isn’t much improved from it’s Gears of War state. The graphics in Unreal Tournament 3 are better, but it’s hard to tell sometimes if you have a TV on the larger side, because it’s 720p.

Unreal Tournament 3 just doesn’t have the same feeling of Call of Duty 4, where you want to play it for hours and hours. There’s not really a campaign, it’s basically playing deathmatch and CTF with the bots over and over again.

The two things that will help get more playtime and become more is that there is a lot of maps to play matches with bots, and there more mods coming out every once in a while. Here’s some mirrors to download some maps and other mods: DM-Shrine DM-Elevation VCTF-Slax DM-Krodan Mutator: VASUT3AutoShields

Unreal Tournament 3 is a great game, but instead of having a campaign with playing tons of deathmatches, it should have a campaign like Gears of War. Also Epic has to release a patch, or something that allows you to play split-screen matches, and it better be free.

Warhawk is probably the best multiplayer experience you’ll have on the PS3. It has only multiplayer.

The local multiplayer is good because your friends can join in whenever they want just by pressing start. There are five huge maps, all with different layouts.

The online play has up to 32 players that you can play with, and has clan support.

Operation:Omega Dawn is the add-on to Warhawk that came out this week. It costs $8, and comes with a map called Omega Factory, a KT-424 Combat Dropship that can transport one pilot, six soldiers, one ground vehicle and features a deadly new weapon, the MBEC-3 Heavy Support Cannon, and new layouts for every map.

Warhawk is great game, it’s just weird that they didn’t come out with a single-player mode or campaign yet. But this allows Sony to create a perfect multiplayer experience.