G4M3 H4XZ0R5... Or something

So as previously mentioned at the weekend, I got Uplink and Darwinia at the weekend off Steam for a low low price of only 6 quid, which works for me. I've been playing them all this week, all though not as much as I'd liked to, having to fit it around revision, but I've given it my best shot. Although I've only played Darwinia once. But I'm entitled to my opinion, so there.

Uplink is a hacking game, which I had no idea about prior to download, except it was a hacking game. Set in some kind of bizarre future where hacking has become so prominent, it qualifies as employment, you take on the role of an "Uplink Agent", whose job it is to, unsurprisingly, hack things. Right from the outset, you really buy into this illusion that it is REAL hacking. The game asks you to put in a username and password, and asks you to wait to connect to the network. It's all very nice.

Visually, there's not a whole lot to see, but it's not really necessary. It reminded me a little bit of text based adventures which I've never played. It is fun to hack computers though as the trace tracker makes you really impatient for the password to be cracked before you get traced and fined and OH MY GOD IT'S SO STRESSFUL!

Onto more relaxed things, Darwinia. I had no idea about this game either, cept it was a sort of real time strategy in a virtual world. Which is sort of what it is, but also sort of not... If that made any sense.

Set in "the world's first virtual theme park", Darwinia is a strategy game with a difference. You don't build troops, you run programs. You don't research upgrades, you get upgrades by collecting Research. You don't collect resources, you collect DNA spirits... Okay several differences. It's a nice change from your average strategy game. The visual design is very good, and does sort of look like what the internet might look like if it were visualised.

The only bad thing about Darwinia is that I feel I'm playing it in the wrong way, although I guess that's my fault, not the game itself. My strategy is to shoot everything, then send my little Engineers in to scoop up the DNA so they don't get hurt. But this strategy doesn't work, since the DNA fades away quite quickly. Ergo, I need to be braver. Actually that's true in real life =)

So that's my take on the first two Introversion games. I'll be playing them for a while yet, so expect to hear more about them.

Three things to cover, very swiftly, since this is already way too long;

1. My iPod has some how fixed itself. It seems to do that a lot. I think it has a learning chip in it.

2. I've been eyeing up the classic Fallout games in preparation for getting Fallout 3 on the XBox (that I don't have yet) Only 6 quid for all three on Amazon? Yes please.

3. View this for me;

This is what I've made using Word and Paint. I know it's not funny, but that's not the point. The point is that I did it. I desperately wanna do a Link's Awakening webcomic but ComicGenesis doesn't like breach of copyright, and I'm worried it wouldn't work.

Meh. What happens happens I guess.

Anyway, I've wasted too much of your time already. Catch you at the weekend.

Me Have No Game Time

Yes, I've had very little gaming time over the past couple o' days. What with school, revision, girlfriend, and family, anybody would think the world is trying to stop me from playing games.
Today I was unfortunately too busy to game as I was tidying a garden. Might not seem like something that would take an entire day, but I'm being paid £120 pounds for it, to give you some scope.

HOWEVER, this evening, I made a purchase via Steam of the Uplink/Darwinia pack. Initially I had only planned to buy Darwinia, because I've recently started following the Introversion Software blog, but since Uplink is essentially thrown in free, I thought I might as well get the whole kit and kaboodle.

As of yet, I've only played Uplink, which for those of you who do not know is a hacking game, and I've very much enjoyed it. I don't wanna go into it too much since it'll gimme something to talk about during the week, but first impressions are good. I find it's more exiting if I pretend it's real, but at the end of the day, that's the same with all games!

Anyway, until I get back to this blog mid-week (probably Wednesday) I bid you adieu...

OH. I'm still playing Wolfenstein, but my iPod has become slightly broken, which makes it a tad difficult to play.

I'm done.

Castle Moars

One of the things I'd never expect to ever do would be to yell out "F***in' Hitler!" in my sixth form common room, but I'd be wrong...

As previously mentioned, I've got Wolfenstein 3-D on my iPod and it's been the only thing I've been playing, bar a coupla Flash games on teh Interweb. I had absolutely no prior knowledge of Wolfenstein, but I doubt story was top of id Software's agenda. You American soldier. Everyone else, enemy. Shooty-shooty.

Two reasons I got this;
1. It's an FPS and I've played a dismal amount of those in the past
2. It's got zombies, and I enjoy shooting zombies

As I played through the first mission, I had a laugh shooting the basic enemies, which I nicknamed Nigels, and then the ones with machine guns, which I dubbed Nehman, after the sound they make when I shoot them. Towards the end of the first mission, I was worried that there weren’t gonna be any zombies, and I got scared when the first boss was not one of the living dead, but a bloke with miniguns for hands, who I called Sponge.

But THEN, zombies started turning up, and I was happy. Weirdly the zombies had machine guns embedded in their chest and fired them by dancing like MJ, but that was alright, because I was shooting them.

As a game Wolfenstein is alright. Sometimes when you are legging it through the corridors you feel like you've stepped into that windows screensaver, but this game only cost 2.99 and originally came out in 1992, so whatever. The gameplay is pretty simple, and it's never really that hard... That said, I have died quite a few times. There are loads of "secrets" in the game, which are basically sliding walls that reveal treasure, or occasionally an enemy, but I seem to have some trouble finding them... Oh well.

But the reason I yelled out the Fuhrer's name was that the third boss turns out to be a bunch of FIRE-BREATHING HITLER CLONES. Weird, I hear you cry, but it gets weirder. You go through a door and, oh, there's Hitler, IN A GIANT ROBOTIC SUIT WITH CHAIN GUNS ON IT! So I'm legging it around, blasting away at him, as I should. I decide for one last push and leap out firing everything I can into him, and hooray! I'm told that I've killed the last enemy, so I relax. BUT THEN! Hitler, the cheating bastard starts shooting at me with more guns! The cad! Who’d of thought you couldn't trust Hitler to fight fair? Honestly...

In conclusion, I like this game. Retro-ness is always good for a chuckle. Oh and it's got Nazi Zombies. Instant Epic-Win.

Also, I've been playing this thing after hearing about on a podcast. It's not a whole lot, but it's an interesting concept and the developer seems to have some good ideas.
Well, until the weekend, stay awesome =)

Bioshocker of the year...

Gasp! Surpise! Epic plot twist! And other such sentiments!

Bioshock 2 has been revealed... again. Re-revealed. Whatever, I don't know. Point is, Gamespot revealed some new footage and interviews with the guys from 2K Marin chatting about the game and so on.

And I'm kinda worried for it. I mean it looks okay, and I wanna play it... But... eesh.

I'm interested by the new concept of being a Big Daddy as opposed to the same character as before. There was the section before where you "dressed up" as a Big Daddy, but actually being one... I dunno. Of what I played of Bioshock, I liked the plasmid powers and the weapons, and both of these look to work quite well in the sequel. The pyrokinetic ability is pretty cool, especially combined with gunplay.

But the reason I'm catiously optimistic is that I think that what made Bioshock so atmospheric, bar the tons of sea water (yes I just made a pressure joke, deal with it), was that the Big Daddies were ever present forces, that you didn't feel you had to attack. When you did, you really felt threatened by them, and would run around trying to dodge them, because they were a great strong hulking mass, that had no intelligence, just hatred. But now, you are the Big Daddy... And the only thing you have to be scared of is the "Big Sister"

Which are essentially athletic Big Daddies and who I forsee will result in many gamers swearing a lot at their televisions... But ce la vie, I'm sure it'll be brill =)

In a complete different, could-only-be-vaguely-linked-via-genre, change of subject, I have bought Wolfenstein 3-D on my iPod. And why the hell not? I know little about this game, apart from;

- It's got Nazis
- It's got zombies
- It looks a bit like DOOM
- The guy looks like the guy from DOOM

But yeah I only bought it this morning and I've played it a little... The controls aren't great but it's good for a laugh, and the minimap is handy. More on this next time.

And finally, I've joined Twitter. Hooray for this;

Running away from Nazi Zombies

Shorter blog today, because I have been busy all day complaining about symbiotes and screaming like a little girl because there was a zombie chewing at my toes.

Spider-Man: Web of Shadows is good, mainly because I'm a MASSIVE Marvel fanboy, but that didn't stop me and singer-songwriter cohort o' mine Robb Akehurst moaning about why it isn't that good.
Main reasons;
- Crap voiceovers
- Not enough other people i.e. Where the hell is Iron Man?
- Iron Spider costume wasn't in it
- The storyline doesn't make any sense (although, as I argued, he shoots webs from his wrists, does realistic matter?)

Also we just like to pick holes =)

I suuuuck at FPSs generally, but I had a go at Nazi Zombies and ended up firing all of my ammo from a machine gun, which I argued was actually an anti-aircraft gun, at one zombie, AND STILL MANAGED TO NOT KILL HIM. Then I stabbed him and he died but the twelve others behind him ended up eating me. Shame. I got the feeling the guys I was playing with were getting a bit pissed off at me, but there we go. Screw them, and all there good aiming and there sensible...ness.

Ahh, forgot to mention Marvel; UA2... Ahh, on Monday then. No worries. See ya then!

Some kind of Zelda pun...

I am actually going to have to stop this blog soon, since all I'm bloody ever playing is Zelda. I mean, I like it but I'm not an effing fanboy. Me and a gaming friend of mine were chatting about it a lot the other day, and I was saying how I didn't really enjoy it that much. He argued that it was a lot better than Twilight Princess because there was so much to do, but I said I found it really dull. I promised him that I would go back to play it, and so yesterday, I started it up on the Wii.
Don't get me wrong I don't think that it's a crap game. I can see how at the time it would have been the best thing since... well since "A Link to the Past" got released. No-one had ever seen Hyrule in 3D, and I'll be honest, Nintendo did a pretty decent job of it. But I just don't really get it. When I played Twilight Princess (which I really enjoyed, by the way) I always felt really driven to get to the next area. Even when I would arrive at a new area, I'd still storm straight through it on Epona, because I actually felt that if I didn't get to where I was supposed to be, the thing I was trying to stop might actually happen. But in Ocarina of Time, I don't feel driven to do anything. There's no sense of urgency. It's partly because the storyline is really dull, but partly because Link walks so bloody slowly. How I am I supposed to be motivated and rushing when I don't have a horse? I went to Lon Lon Ranch, there's like twelve of them there! I could really easily steal one but no, the game won't let me. Damn Nintendo with all their wholesome values.
I'm sure the game will eventually pick up for me. I know that about half way through the game you do the whole Master Sword thing and you become Adult Link and so on, but that seems like an age away... That’s totally an unintended pun right there.

In other news, I'm still playing Rolando. It's still good, if not a tad samey. But I'm still enjoying it, which is the important thing. Good to know that my £3 wasn't wasted.

I've been thinking about retro games a lot recently. I did a random Google images search the other day for Monkey Island, which if you don't know about, you don't deserve the Internet, frankly. I found a really cool fan-made image of what the Monkey Island DS box might look like;

http://vgboxart.com/view/11547/the.secret.of.monkey.island.ds/?replies=20

Remember, people, FAN-MADE. Not official. Probably never gonna happen. Might, but probably won't.

If anyone is interested, I'm learning to play the harmonica at the moment. I can now play "Blowin' in The Wind" pretty well, so there we go.

Oh, and Majora's Mask is available now on VC, which is annoying since I only have 100 Wii Points, and I really want it. You might be thinking this is a tad hypocritical after my dislike of OoT, but you have to understand that this is my Holy Grail of games. Link's Awakening got me into gaming, and at the time, Majora's Mask was just coming out. The concept of playing Zelda in three dimensions blew my seven year-old mind right out the window. So that's why I want it so much. Oh, and fish bone guitar FTW.

Finally, Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 looks awesome. But more about that on Thursday.
End Communication, y'all.

Welcome any newcomers!

I guess this is slightly odd but what the hey.

If you are visiting this blog for the first time because of its being mentioned on Gamespot UK, I bid you a hearty hello! I don't usually talk like that, but I thought I might as well go all out. I'm really grateful to the guys over at Gamespot for mentioning me, and I hoping that it will lead to an increase in my followers... An increase from zero =) But I update every Monday and Thursday (hopefully) and talk about games, games and occasionally my boring personal life. But it'll be mainly games, thankfully

Right, back to our regularly scheduled blog. What have I been playing recently? Well I'll tell you what it isn't. It's definately not a game about a green-tuniced young boy washing up on a mysterious island and fighting hordes of monsters to get to a giant egg. Definately not.

I'm still doing a bit of Rolando, and I've been getting quite aggrivated with it, but in a good way, if that's not an oxymoron. The puzzles are tough, which is good as it provides a challenge. I can't just roll my way through it HAR HAR HAR.

I read today on Gamespot that a new Jak and Daxter game is on the horizon, which made me a little sad. The original "Jak and Daxter" was the game that begun my love affair with the platform genre. Jak 2 taught me the best word in the English language (renegade) and was also brilliant. And Jak 3 had confusing time paradoxes and gladiatoral battles, a winning combination in anyone's book. But then I gave up my PS2 (well it broke actually, but same thing in essence) and I left Jak and Daxter behind. It wasn't that I didn't like it any more, simply I didn't have the resources to play them. When Daxter came out on the PSP I flirted breiefly with the idea of getting it and the console, but this was back in my simple Nintendo fanboy days, and I would never have considered lowering myself to the "evil men" of SONY.

But now Jak's back (baby) and he has a new game coming out on the PS2 and PSP. It's being made by High Impact Games as opposed to Naughty Dog, so it should be interesting to see where they go with it. The subtitle "Lost Frontier" suggests a new big explorable world for you to... uh, explore. I would love to get this game, but alas, I do not have the capability to play it... Unless I buy either a PSP or a PS2, which I guess isn't entirely out of the question... You never know.

My laptop's interent is awful tonight, I'm really gonna have to sort it out. Or just get a MacBook. Yeah, that's a better option, a MacBook...

Ah, webcomics. If only I knew how to make one... NO, BAD EDD! DON'T GET INVOLVED IN ANOTHER HALF BAKED INTERNET PROJECT LIKE WHEN YOU DID ALL THOSE VLOGS ON YOUTUBE!!!

Pretend I didn't say that...