I still can’t wait for this one.  They’re claiming fully destructible environments.  We’ll see.  But even so, I can’t wait.

When that girl was carving a B on her face, then tried to blame it on an Obama supporter, didn’t she realize that mirrors show things in reverse? What a dolt.

I wanted to love Dead Space.  But I suffered through all of its ultra-linear gameplay that desperately needed a compelling story or array of awesome weaponry.

Dead Space is a sci-fi, horror, survival, 3rd person, shooter set in deep space. You play Isaac Clarke, an engineer sent to fix a seemingly routine communications problem aboard a mining ship. But when you arrive, you find that there’s a much larger problem than a minor communications breakdown. Scores of alien creatures have inhabited the ship and killed nearly all of its human crew. Once you’re trapped on the ship, you’re left to survive with the help of only two other crew mates.

Dead Space takes a lot from other games of the same genre, but fails to provide the story of BioShock, the scares of Resident Evil, or the game mechanics of Half Life.

Story

Its story is cliche and boring. Take all the sci-fi movie moments you love, then water them down so profusely that they become undeniably stupid. For some reason, you were the only engineer sent to fix the communication system for a mining ship the size of Manhattan. No one was suspicious of the problem before they sent 5 unarmed workers alone, without any space marines?

Isaac never talks or responds physically to anything he sees or hears. He just stands there hunched as a man behind the window, conveniently locked inside, is eaten by a monster. And when he sees his love, he just stands there without an ounce of emotion.  (Note: this bothered me in Half-Life as well)

The story, about 11 hours long, is literally linear. You click the right stick and a line on the ground shows you where to go next. The line even shows you how to avoid hazards. There’s no side quests or choice of which task to tackle next.  If I didn’t understand the next mundane task I had to complete, I just clicked the stick until I found out where to go next.

If a game’s going to be linear, I at least like it to present a challenge for you to figure out using your own strategy.  I like the Ghost Recon series because I am given a task, I have a bevy of guns to chose from, there’s a big battlefield I can navigate any way I choose, and I can command two dudes to help me out.  It’s takes strategy and skill.  In Dead Space, you follow a line on the ground.

Presentation

The mining ship looks great. For the first 4 hours. At that point I had enough metallic hallways that, for some reason, twist and turn to hide what’s next. The ship’s architect must have had a horror scene in mind when he made every hallway jog back and forth so that you’d have to wonder what was around the next corner to jump out at you.

The game’s gem is its HUD. Instead of breaking you away from the action, menus and video screens float in front of you in 3D. Your life meter is blue bar on your back. The weapon power up system is nice, but you’ll never gather enough resources to fully power up even one of your guns or suits.

Dead Space is not scary in the least. Expected monsters in vents, and “that dude’s not really dead,” make up most of the fright attempts. But they’re so expected that they fail every time.  You face the same enemies over and over.

Controls

I hated the Dead Space’s control system. You get a Mass Effect-like stasis attack, which slows down your enemies to a crawl, and Half Life-like gravity gun, which picks shit up around you to throw at enemies. Both help in solving “puzzles,” and both are annoying as hell to use. You have to be in aim mode (hold down the left trigger) to use them, so you’ll be moving at a snail’s pace before you can slow down an attacking creature. So you can’t just run while you’re using it, or pause the action (ie Mass Effect). You can only reload weapons when you’re in aim mode, too, which leads to an annoying amount of needless deaths.

But is it fun?

I can forgive games with poor controls or shit story if they’re fun.  But Dead Space failed to hold my attention.  It’s too repetative, the bosses are lame (you fight a wall that shits giant flesh balls at you), and I didn’t care about any of the characters.  Frustration outweighed any fun I had by too much to suggest this game at full price.  Rent it or pick it up when it drops to $10 at GameStop.

I’m not tired of WWII games (Thanks Call of Duty for going back to WWII!). I could kill fuck faced nazis all day. But there are two games stealth-style shooters set in WWII coming out soon and I have to choose one. One, Velvet Assassin, looks kinda lame. The other, Saboteur, looks amazing.

The concept is interesting. You play an Irishman whose stuck in Paris during the nazi occupation. There’s a “you killed my family, now I’m going to get revenge” plot line involved, so I’m hoping the story isn’t too lame. I still think that Medal of Honor: Underground is the best French Resistance game. But maybe Pandemic can outdo EA this time around.

Viva La France!

BioWare is working on a new RPG successor to Baldur’s Gate called Dragon Age: Origins.  I’m a huge fan of Mass Effect, KOTOR, and Jade Empire, so this one’s high on my excited to play list. Dragon Age is slated to be released in early 2009, and I can’t wait.

he wants his Wario commercial back.

I’m fucking buying Mirror’s Edge.  The new trailer is awesome.

I finished Braid last week.  It was awesome.  It’s innovative, fun, emotional, challenging, and exciting.  Buy it now and don’t cheat.  The satisfaction of gaining each puzzle piece is worth the frustration.

Like I said, the writing is terrible, but there’s a compelling ending that’s worth a full play through.

Now that I’m done, though, I wish I could sell it back.  There’s barly any replay value.

This is Jason sent me this article about how you’re playing the bad guys in Gears of War.

According to the article titled Why You’re Actually Playing as the Bad Guys in Gears of War:

“Brave humans battling valiantly for the bright future of their world against a soulless alien horde? Not at all. Arrogant human invaders trying vainly to maintain their stranglehold on an abused and suppressed planet. That’s more like it. Read on to find out why we’ve been playing the bad guys all along.”

So, it turns out the humans aren’t the victims of colonization and oppression–the Locusts are.

While playing the game, I wasn’t thrilled about being a “cog” in a machine anyway.  At least I didn’t get a tattoo of the GOW equivilant of a swastika on my arm.  Idiot.