Sniper Elite and American Nightmare

I have updated "the first post."  This includes dates of reviews and has been rearranged.  Here is the link:  http://fpsandmtg.blogspot.com/2010/08/first-post.html  I don't update that as often as I should.

Game:  Sniper Elite
Year (s):  2005
Company:  dev.  Rebellion
pub.  MC2 France
Engine:  Asura
Type:  Stealthy Shooter
Viewpoint:  Mostly Third-Person
GameRanking Score: 73
My Score:  Why did I buy this in the first place?


Plot

At the tail end of WW2's European theater, you take on the role of an American sniper, disguised as a German, dispatching Russian targets.  The cold war began before the world war ended.

Engine

Rebellion has continually used, and improved, the Asura engine since 2003.  Graphical quality, therefore, has a large range.  As a 2005 game, this was not a contender.  While I didn't hit any glitches in the brief time I played this game, the graphics were, at best, comparable to UT 2K4.

Combat/Gameplay

Army-crawl from one point of cover to another, take a couple of shots, and then crawl away before the enemy pinpoints your position.  Ideally, fire in sync with bombs or thunder.  Optional aiming problems include wind, bullet fall, and breathing.  I found this game style, while more realistic, tedious at best.  Everyone has their own line between challenging and stupid, and this crossed it for me.

Expansions / DLC / Sequels

Sniper Elite V2 was a remake that came out in 2012.  It looks better, and has at least one DLC.

Final Thoughts

I'm not good at sniping, and I don't like being forced to sneak around.  This game just wasn't my type.


Alan Wake's American Nightmare

Alan Wake's American Nightmare has a few things in common with Alan Wake's DLC: the plot is garbage and the game is short.  This is compounded by cakewalk combat and poor writing.  Play Alan Wake.  It's good.  Don't play anything else associated with the franchise.

Alan Wake Review

Game:  Alan Wake
Year (s):  2010 (XBox 360), 2012 (PC release)
Company:  dev.  Remedy Entertainment
pub.  Microsoft Game Studios et al.
Engine:  MAX-FX 3.0 using Havok physics and Umbra occlustion
Type:  Survival Horror, Shooter
Viewpoint:  Third-Person
Metacritic Score: 83
My Score:  A refreshingly good game.

Price (as of April 8, 2013)

Regular list price on Steam:  $29.99
Lowest Buy-It-Now on eBay (new, with shipping):  $12.99

My Game Time:  23 hours, first time on easy, including both DLC

Obligatory Trailer:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AF2ZdvBtp1k


Plot

Alan Wake, a successful author a la Stephen King, has writer's block.  His wife, Alice, takes him on a retreat.  After getting to their cabin on Cauldron Lake, the two get in an argument, and Alan goes down to the dock to cool off.  Some time later Alice screams.  Alan runs to help, and dives in to the lake.

The next thing you know, Alan's in a wrecked car with his head bleeding.  He fights shadowy figures that disappear when defeated.  He gets to a gas station to call for help, to find that a week has gone by.  The sheriff picks him up, and tells him that there is no cabin on Cauldron Lake.

It's a great start, and the plot really motivated me to keep playing.  This has more story than I've come to expect, with nods to Twilight Zone, Stephen King, and others.  The ending ties up most of the mystery, but leaves a couple of big questions unanswered that could be addressed in further games.

The plot is told in acts.  Each act ends with an song to sum up events.  This is a cool idea and they implemented it well.  Oh, by the way, the plot is by the Sam Lake, the same guy that wrote for Max Payne.

Engine

MAX-FX 3.0 is the newest engine from the developers that brought us Max Payne.  Graphics are significantly better than the last Max Payne title, while the third-person view, some of the sounds, level design, and the general look feel familiar.  As a port of a 2010 console game, it is not in the running for cutting-edge beautiful, but it works and I didn't snag on any bugs.

Save System

Manual Save? No
Quick Save?  No
Area Load Save?  Yes
Checkpoint Save?  Yes

Combat/Gameplay

Enemies are protected by The Dark Presence, so you'll have to burn their darkness away before you can hurt them.  Flashlights, floodlights, flares, flashbangs, anything will do.  Then a limited arsenal of firearms finishes the task.  This allows for the novelty of R to reload guns, and Q to replace flashlight batteries.

I tried playing the game on normal, but ran out of ammo.  There is no melee attack, so I started over on easy.  I'm not sure what I could have done on normal; I don't play a great deal of survival horror, limited-ammo games.


Expansions / DLC / Sequels

"The Signal," and, "The Writer," are two very short DLC.  These add a small amount of additional gameplay, but don't do anything to move the story forward..

Alan Wake's American Nightmare, "is not a sequel."  It take place after the first though, with the same gameplay and some of the same characters.  This came out in 2012.

Remedy has said that they are not done with Alan Wake yet, and there is a lot of speculation for Alan Wake 2, but no information yet.  There was a web-based miniseries prequel to Alan Wake created called, "Bright Falls."


Final Thoughts

This was a longer article because Alan Wake has more to offer than a lot of the cheap games I grab on sales.  While the DLC were pretty limp fare, I thoroughly enjoyed Alan Wake from start to finish.

Far Cry 2 Review

Game:  Far Cry 2
Year (s):  2008
Company:  dev.  Ubisoft Montreal
pub.  Ubisoft
Engine:  Dunia
Type:  Open-world, Shooter
Viewpoint:  First-Person
Metacritic Score:  85
My Score:  Average enough to play something better.

Price (as of March 24, 2013)

Regular list price on Steam:  $9.99
Lowest Buy-It-Now on eBay (new, with shipping):  $10

Obligatory Trailer:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMTDjKusVqY

See Also- Far Cry Review:
http://fpsandmtg.blogspot.com/2011/11/far-cry-review.html


Plot

You're a mercenary sent into a war-torn African region to kill an arms dealer.  You catch malaria instead, and get caught up in the civil war, all the while hoping to track down and kill the arms dealer.

Dunia Engine

This looks ok, but not the best at the time.  AI is much dumber than in Far Cry.

Save System

Manual Save?  Yes
Quck Save?  Yes
Area Load Save?   Not sure
Checkpoint Save?  Yes


Combat/Gameplay

Grab three weapons and some medkits, get in a vehicle, and start killing.  Standard fare for the genre.

Far Cry 2 does a couple of things that really turn me off.  First, the setting, plot, characters, environments, and enemies have abolutely nothing to do with the first game.  Secondly, Far Cry 2 had a different developing company.  As is sometimes the case, the gameplay was starkly dissimilar to the first.  These factors all together left me disappointed and wondering why it had the Far Cry name at all.  


Expansions / DLC / Sequels

A DLC called Foturne's pack added some new weapons, vehicles, and multiplayer maps.

Far Cry 3, also by Ubisoft, came out in 2012.  It had gotten fairly good reviews and has been described as, "Skyrim with guns."

Final Thoughts

This here's an average game at best, with the added satisfaction-level of such sequels as Highlander 2, Fievel Goes West, or The Lion King 1 1/2.

Wolfenstein 3D: Spear of Destiny Review

Game:  Wolfenstein 3D: Spear of Destiny
Year (s):  1992
Company:  dev.  id Software
pub.  FormGen Corporation
Engine:  Wolfenstein 3D engine
Type:  Old School Shooter
Viewpoint:  First-Person

Price (as of  March 19, 2013)

Regular list price on Steam:  $4.99
Lowest Buy-It-Now on eBay (UNOPENED, with shipping):  $65

See Also:
Wolfenstein 3D Review:  http://fpsandmtg.blogspot.com/2011/09/wolfenstein-3d-review.html


The Second Wolf 3D Game

Spear of Destiny offers gameply and environments identical to Wolfenstein 3D.  The plot is nicely contained in the instruction manual, and otherwise unknown.

Two additional 21-level mission packs were created by FormGen and released in 1994.  These did not sell well.

Controls for the game are pretty different from today, making things a little akward.  Forcing the game to close unconventionally, or using ALT TAB to minimize it, resets the controls to default.  Maps are still mazes.  Enemies are still silent after they make an initial noise.

I did not play this game for very long.  I'd played the original Wolfenstein 3D as a child, so it had some nostalgic aspects.  I still remembered secrets in a few levels.  Spear of Destiny is the same game, without the nostalgia.  I'd never even heard about it until a few years ago.  Final verdict: if you didn't play it in the nineties, don't start now.

Prototype Review

Game:  Prototype
Year (s):  2009
Company:  dev.  Radical Entertainment
pub.  Activision
Engine:  Titanium
Type:  Open World, Platformer, Hack 'n Slash
Viewpoint:  Third-Person
Metacritic Score: 79
My Score:  I agree with Metacritic.

Price (as of  March 17, 2013)

Regular list price on Steam:  $19.99
Lowest Buy-It-Now on eBay (new, with shipping):  $17

Game Time: 21 hours.  This includes a few hours on normal before starting over on easy.

Obligatory Trailer:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvsUkUaJjYs


Plot

Alex Mercer was at Penn station when a biological weapon was unleashed.  Three weeks later he wakes up in a morgue.  His memory is spotty, soldiers are trying to kill him, and he now has superhuman powers.  The initial goal is to take revenge on everyone responsible for the biological attack.  Also, zombies.

The plot comes through in bits and pieces, partly through killing people.  There are a few cool twists near the end, but these don't do enough to compensate for some of the game's lacking aspects.

Engine

It's called the Platinum engine.  It looks ok.  No bugs.

Save System

Manual Save?  No
Quick Save?  No
Area Load Save?  No
Checkpoint Save?  Yes

Combat/Gameplay

The playable character is a shapeshifter.  Spending experience points allows you to unlock attacks (these often involve changing the arms into weapons), maneuverability bonuses, and other useful abilities.  In addition to attacking, running up walls, jumping high, throwing cars, and gliding across Manhattan, the player can disguise themselves.  Simply murder a person (preferably unobserved) and you can look just like them.  Murder is also the easist way to gain life.  It's not a character that derives a great deal of sympathy.

Gameplay is obviously directed toward consoles.  I unlocked a bunch of moves that I never figured out how to actually use.


Expansions / DLC / Sequels

Prototype 2 came out in 2012, pitting one of the infected against Mercer in a ravaged city.


Final Thoughts

The difficulty isn't balanced whatsoever.  On normal, I got stuck two hours in.  On easy, I was a god for most of the game, but a few parts were a huge pain in the ass.  Because the game called for constant murder, I didn't connect with the character, or care at all if they died.  Gameplay was fun initially but became repetitive about halfway through, and poorly ported to the PC.  A couple of cool plot elements and a glitch-free engine do just enough to make this a fantastically ho-hum game.  I would not highly recommend this one.

Painkiller: Redemption Review

Painkiller: Redemption

I love a bargain.  I bought the Painkiller franchise on sale, when it was four games, for about ten bucks (it is now six games, though the most recent is a remake of the first using Unreal Engine 3).  The first Painkiller had merit at the time, but lacked Serious Sam, and the engine was a piece of shit.  Redemption, like the last iteration, uses the same shitty engine to create fan-made content in guise of a game.

I played this game for about half an hour.  I played on easy, because I assumed it would be a chore and I wanted it over with as soon as possible.  On Redemption, easy means FINAL DOOM HARD.  While I didn't die, I was surrounded by hordes of monsters more than once.  The first level has more than one thousand enemies.

Sadly, I fell off a ledge near the end of the first level and could not progress.  It's a good thing then, that I didn't want to.  Redemption is another garbage, fan-created game, and the latest Serious Sam is far superior.

Section 8: Prejudice

Game:  Section 8: Prejudice
Year (s):  2011
Company:  dev.  TimeGate Studios
pub.  TimeGate Studios
Engine:  Unreal Engine 3
Type:  Shooter, multiplayer oriented
Viewpoint:  Third-person
Metacritic Score:  77
My Score:  Not worth it.

Price (as of  March 3, 2013)

Regular list price on Steam:  $14.99
Lowest Buy-It-Now on eBay (new, with shipping):  Not applicable, no physical copies exist.

Game Time:  About five hours on normal for the campaign.

Obligatory Trailer:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4j_t_HfLSBs

See Also
Section 8 Review:  http://fpsandmtg.blogspot.com/2012/02/section-8-review.html


(plot omitted from this review due to its lameness)


Save System

Manual Save?  No
Quck Save?  No
Area Load Save?  Yes
Checkpoint Save?  Yes


Combat/Gameplay

Team-based combat, deployable objects, jet packs, and alternate loadouts.  In a nutshell, the same thing as the first, except the campaign is half the length.  The AI is so poor that bots on my team were constantly walking right in to my line of fire or throwing grenades at my feet.

The only new (and cool) aspects of this are a cool aiming toy and the adoption of a checkpoint save system.


Expansions / DLC / Sequels

A few DLC exist offering additional maps to play.

Final Thoughts

The CEO of TimeGate is giving a motivational speech to get the team excited about their work.  "Okay guys, it's time to turn things up!  I want more reviewers praising our games as mediocre, adequate, and okay!  Remember our slogan, it's not good, it's JUST GOOD ENOUGH!  Go team!"