It’s a shame that everyone’s favorite hedgehog couldn’t keep up with his psilocybin eating Italian counterpart. Back in 94′, I thought for sure Sonic would turn out to be more popular, (what with the cartoons being voiced by Urkle and all).
I’m a tad bit bitter…
Here’s some fresh footage from the Leipzig Games Convention in Germany.
If ya axe me, Mario 64 still pwns them all.
Gamersyde has got the goods. Check out all four parts below, or download them each in 1280×720p glory. These videos show more of Tsavo Highway, and the replay value in the single player campaign.
Mark it on your calendar, set a reminder, do what you’ve got to do. On Monday the gates open up at CharlieOscarDelta.com. There are a limited number of “tokens” (download codes) being released on a first come, first serve basis. That means be there at 12 noon, Pacific Daylight Time (thats 3pm for those of us on the East Coast). The current wave is restricted to 18+, with Xbox Live Gold, residing in the US.
I am presently in the friends and family wave of the beta, so I can tell you with assurance that this game kicks ass. I don’t want infinityward slapping my wrist, so I’m keeping my shut until the beta goes public.
You best study up on your Call of Duty 4 knowledge, because you are going to need to answer some trivia questions to get in. CharlieOscarDelta.com has all the info you will need.
Update: Time for East Coast corrected… thanks Hypersteric.
I had some free time today, so after getting the damn Historian achievement in BioShock, I decided to play around in Photoshop. What do you think? When I get around to it, I will redesign the rest of the site to more or less match, and just look cleaner. Sorry, but I had to add some ad banners. I’m still paying every month out of my pocket to host the site. I’m just crossing my fingers I can at least break even. The hole in my pocket is getting ever bigger, and my wanted list is growing longer (games and the like).
Please drop some feedback on what you want to see more or less of. I’m sure you are going to say “more posts!” I would love that too. I’m open to new writers, so if you are passionate about games and can string a sentence together in proper english, let me know. Hope you are all enjoying BioShock (except Tarun–I hope you are enjoying Totem Ball). Burn!
Here’s some pretty decent shaky cam footage from GC 07. First up is a short clip from the campaign level Tsavo Highway (Click video to play). I’ve got to say the environment looks pretty gorgeous. That transport hog should also be good from getting you and your 3 buddies around.
Next is some footage from the map “Sandtrap.” When you’re done playing coop, this is what it will look like owning said buddies in mutiplayer:
1 month to go…
I don’t normally write reviews, and you surely don’t need another review (97 average review on Metacritic should tell you everything). So I will more or less give you my abbreviated opinion of the game.
To start off with, I have played the game through to completion, but only once. There are no less than to two endings to the game. And I think it’s safe for me to assume they are rather different endings, too. I’ve just completely ODed on BioShock in the past week so there isn’t a chance I’ll be repeating the whole game any time soon. Which brings me to my next point–game length.
Trusty old shotgun.
The game is pretty damn long. Not too long you can’t beat it in a couple days like I did (if you can forgo having a life). I didn’t time myself, but it was probably somewhere near 20 hours. This was on normal difficulty, and exploring as much as I could. If you want to find all the audio diaries and gun upgrade stations, you’re going to need to scour the place. I believe there are ten weapon upgrade stations (one time use, two upgrades per weapon) and a whopping 122 diaries (give or take). Getting the “Historian” achievement will not be like finding 20 measly COG tags. No, these diaries can be anywhere. Including in the bottom of a trashcan in a closet. In case you can’t tell, I’m a little bitter because I was hoping to get this achievement by being diligent on my first pass. While you can go back to find them, there are a few that if you don’t get them at the first opportunity, you never will. Plus, at the end of the game, it warns you that if you go on from there, you will not be able to return. Fair warning, except for the fact that even if you turn around at this point to go back in the game to look for things you’ve missed, you are already locked in the final level. I was forced to go back to an older save in order to backtrack.
Backtracking is going to be something you do quite a bit. It’s actually not so bad because the environment changes in a few instances, plus the fact that the whole game is just so gorgeous, you won’t mind. BioShock has open environments (meaning you can pretty much explore an entire environment at will), but not an openended story. You need to follow the games action in order. The entire story is driven by the radio you pick up at the beginning of the game and the audio diaries you find along the way. Some of those 122 diaries we talked about earlier are required to progress the story (these are differentiated by glowing gold). It’s actually a very effective way to tell a story, and quite enjoyable.
Not a good idea. Trust me.
My biggest disappointment has to be the games biggest selling point. All they showed off in the trailers and videos was how many ways you can set traps and kill your enemies. While you CAN do this, there is really no point. None of your enemies are hard to defeat. Maybe it’s my years of FPS training that is holding me back. My mind thinks resource and ammo management… it doesn’t seem effective to use a proximity mine, tornado trap and trip wire to take out an enemy when a wrench to the back of the head would do. There was really only one point in the game where you are encouraged to set up a trap. While you are locked in a room waiting for something (no spoilers), your buddy Atlas tells you Ryan is sending some bad guys after you and you should get ready for them. At last! I went all out… proximity mines behind all the doors, followed by tornado traps, and a spider web of trip wires. A spider web, I tell you! I swear, all it would have taken was a single mine or grenade. All I did was effective trap MYSELF INTO the room. The game REALLY could have used more scenarios like this, with bigger/longer waves of enemies. In that 20 hours, there were only maybe 3 cases like this. You could potentially set up traps for big daddies, but they have a weak point that makes it all too easy to kill them.
Much better.
Complaints aside, BioShock is an unbelievably ambitious game and it pulls off just about all it set out to do. It creates an environment with an atmosphere that is completely untouched. The game seriously could not have a better art direction. I don’t even want to touch the story because there are too many things to give away. A lot of people seem concerned because there is no back story for your character. I can’t tell you much, but there very much IS a back story. Any questions you might ask yourself manage to seamlessly answer themselves in the game. I can’t remember a game that is so compelling and left me so engaged. This game deserves the acclaim.
I’m not gonna lie, the fanboy within me jumped for joy when I heard this news. The lack of exclusive studio support was always pointed at as HD DVDs downfall. The Blu-ray folks were just waiting for the day Universal (the only HD DVD exclusive studio) jumped shipped. Well, someone jumped shipped, and it was Paramount, DreamWorks Animation leaving Blu-ray in favor of HD DVD. Before, Blu-ray fans were only missing out on Universal titles, now there are multiple studios with blockbuster movies you can only watch on HD DVD.
I guess this news is partly bad, too, since it means to “format war” will continue to wage on. While I have both formats, I far prefer HD DVD, as I think most would who have tried both. All we need are some cheaper standalone players, and sales could easily sway back in HD DVD’s favor. Blu-ray has gotten a huge install base boost from Sony’s trojan horse PS3. A video game console can help sway a battle, but it’s ultimately up to standalone players getting into peoples houses. HD DVD already has the upper hand here, as standalone HD DVD player prices continue to drop and be cheaper than Blu-ray. Go on HD DVD, fight the good fight.
After a short delay, the demo for EA’s Skate is is now available for download on Xbox Live. While the download is 1.09GB, the Live seems to be speedy this morning and the download is flying (no repeat of BioShock 24 hour download). I believe this demo will allow you upload your skate videos to the skate.reel at skate.ea.com, so show us what you’ve got. Although EA’s website appears to be down right now, surely from from skate fanboys dancing with glee on the forums.
After visiting three Toys R Us stores, I found myself a copy of Bioshock. This will continue to be hit and miss for most, as the first two stores had no clue why I was asking nearly a week before the release date. When I finally did find a copy, it was one of only two. With a little luck, though, you might be unlocking Rapture’s secrets a good amount of time before the rest of the world. The best part is there are two promos to sweeten this deal. If you buy Madden 08, you get a second game for half off. That’s $90 for both Madden and Bioshock. Apply this 20% off coupon to Madden, and you’ll walk out the door with both games for $77.98 before tax. If you don’t want to keep Madden, the amount you sell it for over $18 is the amount you are saving on Bioshock. Best of luck!
CompUSA has a sweet 360 bundle if you’re in the market for an Elite and Madden. How does an Xbox 360 Elite, an extra wireless controller, and Madden 08 for $449.99 sound? Yep, you’re basically getting the controller and game for free, saving yourself a cool $100. That will be hard to beat. If you are really cheap, they also have the bundle with a regular 20GB model, but at only $40 cheaper, the value conscious will know the Elite is the best deal.
