PAX 2008: Hands on with Valkyria Chronicles
A turn based, tactical RPG set in an alternate 1930s wartime reality. This sounds eerily familiar to another game which I recently reviewed here. The small country of Gallia has been doing all it can to stay out of a world wide conflict between the... - Read the full story
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Review: Madden NFL 09I don't know about you, but I can't believe it's been 20 years since the first Madden game. I didn't play that initial vision of games to come, as it would be another 4 years before getting trounced by my roommate in my freshman residence hall room. Ahh, even to this... - Read the full review
A turn based, tactical RPG set in an alternate 1930s wartime reality. This sounds eerily familiar to another game which I recently reviewed here. The small country of Gallia has been doing all it can to stay out of a world wide conflict between the East European Imperial Alliance and the Atlantic Federation. Unfortunately for them, Gallia is rich in a particular type of ore which is a highly valuble energy source.
SEGA developed the CANVAS engine specifically for this game and are hoping the gameplay can match the pretty graphics. The nice folks at the SEGA booth were happy to talk all about Valkyria Chronicles and give me a little private time with her as well. Is this game going to be a hit or should I use my command points to toss it in the trash?
Having met up with Jay in line at the entrance to the convention hall floor, we made our way through the doors and he says to me, "So, you're doing Gears 2 right? I would head straight........oh, well there you go." He didn't finish the thought because the giant Gears 2 booth was the first thing you see as you walk onto the floor. 5 or 6 rows of seating in a mini-theater facing a podium and two flat screens. Xbox colors all around shining in that lime hue.
Off to one side were 10 demo stations where the game was running. I made my way over and promptly took a place at one of the kiosks. While single player campaign was not running, the Multiplayer on display was fantastic. My first notation here is 'Graphically Amazing'. I'm sure that's no surprise to anyone but it is an improvement over the first GOW.
Hit the jump, I can hear the chainsaws warming up.
I’m going to have to come clean about something. I’m not actually a 22-year old male. I am, in fact, a 7-year old girl. There, I said it. Are you happy now? And because I am a prepubescent female, vampires give me nightmares, scary movies make me jump out of my seat, and zombies scare the snot out of me.
Now that you know all this, you can probably guess the exact level of excitement I was feeling when I walked up to the Valve booth at PAX to play Left 4 Dead. As you can imagine, I was not necessarily looking forward to the experience. No, I wasn’t prepared for a poor game; I just don’t like the undead. Call me prejudiced.
So how surprised do you think I was when my time spent with Left 4 Dead ended up being some of the best gaming I experienced on the show floor? Okay, maybe I wasn’t really that surprised that I enjoyed the game. But, I was surprised that my pants were still dry. Frankly, it wouldn’t have mattered if my boxers had been a little damp; the game was so much fun that I wouldn’t have cared.
Hit the jump to get into the safe room. But don’t startle the Witch. Seriously, she’ll f*** you up.
Occupying the majority of Sony’s floor space at PAX 2008, Resistance 2 was on hand to dish out a healthy serving of multiplayer goodness to the masses. And for the entirety of the convention, this was one of the few games that always had people lining up to play. In fact, the only times I didn’t see a queue of at least 4 people behind each kiosk occurred during the network downtimes at Sony’s booth.
For the majority of the convention, we were treated to a single, enormous multiplayer map. And for hours on end, gamers were able to take part in matches of Meltdown, in which teams attempt to capture and hold nodes throughout the map. Although these games quickly devolved into deathmatches, it was still quite entertaining to run around with the Chimera once again.
But no matter how much nostalgia-induced adrenaline I felt, the experience really wasn’t that memorable. Sure, it’s always fun to play through some new content in a quality franchise. But, the game still feels like a lot of other shooters, and the setup Sony had at PAX certainly didn’t help the overall aura of the game.
I felt a slight tap on my shoulder. As I turned, I saw Jay “Skittles” Van Beveren, wide-eyed, staring at me with excitement. “Dude, we have to go play LittleBigPlanet right now.”
Let me dish out a little factoid here: When you’re standing three feet away from a 62-inch high-definition television, it’s very easy to be in awe of what’s on the screen. At the same time, it’s very easy to pick out all the tiny little glitches and graphical errors in the game you’re playing. Luckily for us, there was plenty of the former and essentially none of the latter. If I had been able to see my own face, I’m sure I would have looked like a 6-year old on the morning of his birthday.
Every tiny detail was crystal clear, and the action on-screen was unbelievably smooth. Our precious little SackBoy characters danced effortlessly across the screen, each with a unique and colorful costume, and each with stunning animation. Not only did the game look fantastic, but it played wonderfully as well. As we played through three different levels, we laughed, we cried, we screamed, and we laughed some more. The random and spontaneous fun we experienced certainly bodes well Sony’s newest mascot.
Hit the jump for the full description, and find out how Jay finally met his demise.
The MMO game is hard to break into. There’s the one big scary monster that everyone is both afraid of and attempting to at least do as well as, and then there’s everything else. So what makes Warhammer Online different than the rest? I mean, they too have cartoony orcs and dwarves and keeps and a two-sided war and isn’t it just exactly the same?
There’s something that Warhammer Online will have that WoW won’t have: a mature experience.
No, it’s not Professor Layton. Everyone please stop saying that. It’s in fact a platformer game with a very hot catch, and you should keep your eye on this one.
Henry Hatsworth in the Working Title features Henry, a very posh British explorer, trying to track down artifacts that will allow him to control the puzzle world, an area he inadvertently opened up and must not get under control. He can run, jump, and gun in his world, but can also switch over the puzzle world to get rid of hidden dangers and receive power-ups.
I think it’s about time that we have a “free” online game that isn’t obnoxious J-RPG gibberish. A funded Counterstrike with leveling-up and user-friendly customization may be a lot of fun. It’s also about time that someone trivialized WWII. That war’s gotten a free ride since the 1950's.
Battlefield: Heroes is the cartoony, ridiculous cover of the Battlefield series, crafted to appeal to those who both want to shoot things but who don’t feel like taking it seriously. And it plays exactly like it’s supposed to play. Let’s hope that social aspect make it worth everyone’s time.
Review: Madden NFL 09I don't know about you, but I can't believe it's been 20 years since the first Madden game. I didn't play that initial vision of games to come, as it would be another 4 years before getting trounced by my roommate in my freshman residence hall room. Ahh, even to this... - Read the full review
PAX 2008: Hands on with Valkyria Chronicles
A turn based, tactical RPG set in an alternate 1930s wartime reality. This sounds eerily familiar to another game which I recently reviewed here. The small country of Gallia has been doing all it can to stay out of a world wide conflict between the... - Read the full story
I felt a slight tap on my shoulder. As I turned, I saw Jay “Skittles” Van Beveren, wide-eyed, staring at me with excitement. “Dude, we have to go play LittleBigPlanet right now.”
