The Wait

Note originally posted on Thursday, July 2, 2009 at 12:47pm

I hate this time of year. It's cold, the flu is running rampant (oink oink) and video game developers are all in hibernation in their snug little caves made of $100 bills. Its basically 6 months of replaying the same excellent games and drooling over scraps of news until spring.

On a better note however, I just picked up a new GeForce 9500 GT and a 1TB external HDD. Since I've been running my PC for a while without a Grapics card at all, it's good to finally be able to PC game again. I can also recommend Steam to anyone who's interested in playing PC games. (http://store.steampowered.com/)

Steam basically allows you to buy and download most games available at the moment. It's incredibly easy and only requires a credit card to make the purchase. Once you buy, the game is stored online until you decide you want to play it, at which point you download and install it. Obviously, you need a good internet connection for this. It took me about an hour to download Dawn Of War II.

I also need to point out that Dawn Of War II is totally awesome and has saved me from gaming boredom for the last few weeks. The mechanics of the game itself are sweet and easy to get into (except for those freakin Terminators and their tendancy to run the fuck away from everything! I THOUGHT YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE HARDCORE!!!) and it totally differs from the originals. It's well worth picking up if you're bored and into WH40k.

I'm probably going to pick up Crysis later this week. I downloaded the demo the other day and it impressed me and since I can pick the original up for $29.95 or the full pack with Warhead for $59 (everything is waaay cheaper on Steam) I think it's definetly worth the look. I had it running at 60fps on medium so I think I should be able to bump some of the settings up to max and make it look really shiny.

So that's life at the moment. Gobbling scraps of info on all the sequals coming out later this year and indulging in some much needed PC gaming.

Cheerio cats.

Update: Just got a second set of Terminator armour and gave it to my assault squad along with a Thunder Hammer and Storm shield... They now do 740 damage in melee which is about 300 more damage than my FRIGGING DREADNAUGHT! I rescind my previous statement about Terminators... Thaddeus took on almost a whole map full of Tyranid's by himself with minimal healing help from my commander and a bit of heavy cover from my Devastator squad.

How far are you prepared to go to save someone you love?

Note originally posted on Wednesday, May 19, 2010 at 1:23am

  So it was inevitable that I would eventually get around to playing Heavy Rain. Anyone that knows me at all knows I would have to write at least a few word on this game.

This is possibly one of the most unique and coolest games I have ever played. I really, really hope that another one comes out. Not Heavy Rain 2 because it would kind of ruin things, but just another game in the same vein. The fight scenes are some of the most interesting, exhilerating things I have ever experienced in a video game. I really felt like I was there.

I'm not going to spoil this one by revealing anything except a plot synopsis. It's too good to give away, like a good detective novel. The only thing I'll give away is that the title is not a misnomer. It rains... a fuckload... for the whole game.

Basically the story goes thus: A serial killer is on the loose in the city, kidnapping kids and killing them by drowning them and dumping their bodies in the wasteland with nothing but an Orchid on their chest and a small Origami figure clenched in their hand. He's quickly dubbed The Origami Killer (stupid americans pronounce it Ori-gamy). A father's son is kidnapped and you take on the roles of four people whos stories intertwine on the way to solving the case. Incase you've noticed, this game is not for children. It features sex, drugs, nudity, violence, torture, almost rape and of course... MURDER!

Ethan Mars is the desperate father who's son has been kidnapped by The Origami Killer. He will do anything to save his son.

Ethan Mars - Loving father.

Madison Paige is the savvy female journalist who accidently stumbles on the story of the decade.

Madison Paige - Did I mention nudity? Oooh Yeah!

Norman Jayden is the FBI agent (with the coolest set of sunglasses I've ever seen) who is drafted to the local PD and partnered with a psychotic Lieutenant to help catch the killer.

Norman Jayden - or as I like to call him, NEO!

Scott Shelby is the ex-cop turned private eye who is hired by the families of the victems to track down the murderer.

Scott Shelby - Fat ex-cop with a drinking problem.

The game switches between these four characters at regular intervals and the descisions you make with each affect the eventual outcome of the game.

That's really all I want to say on this game other than if you play it, I recommend playing it from start to finish without stopping. It took me approximately 12 hours. But it was one of the best 12 hours I've ever spent infront of a screen, movies, games, porn included. It feels like you're watching a really good movie.

9 out of 10 because sometimes the camera/controls can get fucking annoying. If the game wasn't as spectaular as it is this would be a major problem... but the story is so good that I couldn't put it down and more than overrides the camera problems.

Play it... now.

Update

So I have moved five notes over so far. It's a bit harder than I thought it would be as all the formatting gets screwed up when I copy across, so I have to re-do it all. Otherwise I am quite happy about this decision. If anyone has any suggestions on anything I can do to improve this or if anyone knows places where I can list my blog for free, please let me know.


Hopefully I will get a few more across this afternoon and have something brand new posted up sometime early next week. I am thinking another article at this stage, 'My top something something blah blah'. I quite enjoyed writing the game themes one so we'll see what my nicotine addled brain can come up with.


Watch this space.