Skyrim

It had to happen at some stage, even with my Steam catalog bulging like a sack of potatoes about to explode forth with shards of gaming-based french-fry shrapnel each game crying out to me for attention...

It's been a year since I got it, and now - Now it is time for me to take a firmly lodged arrow to my knee and see what all the FUSS-RO-DAH is about...

What was I expecting?

being that I've logged about 4 human life-spans worth of time in Fallout 3 & New Vegas I had a feeling it's pretty much be more of the same, I was wrong, sure there is visual comparison, even the general gaming system feels samey.

But there is something more about Skyrim, I've lodges just over 100 hours in the game so far and only just feel like I'm starting to really get into it! the first 50 hours were hugely fun, exploring, finding things, dying... dying some more... learning how not to die... and then dying.

But each part of the experience has been just such enthralling and must-play-more style gaming, this is one of only a few titles which to date have made me literally be confused when I look up to see that it's 3am. Skyrim is part adventure... part temporal black hole, absorbing time from our reality and turning it into fun.

Any Bad Thoughts?

I'll confess, the very early game was unforgiving, aggravating, frustrating, but for each time I was killed by a random wolf I've now jumped into battle yelling dragon-speakanees wielding odd looking weapons gleefully enacting my virtual revenge on their furry little pixel-butts.

The sound is passable but really it's nothing super amazing, If I were to highlight the weak-spot of this game it would have to be the audio.

Wrap it up, like a Draugr mummy.

I'm now fully immersed in a world that is gargantuan, and have yet to find so much, least of all the fact that already I can see this game has great potential for replay-ability, use a different style, try different quest lines, so much to get done it really really is going to be hard to put this one down.

Oh, and the small fact that there are a wealth of brilliant fan-made mods for the game, allowing me to tweak the experience even more to my personal taste and ensuring that I get 110% of my game squeezed out.

The graphics are amazing, but start adding a few mods and I truly am blown away at just how awesome things look. A lot of time and effort has gone into this game, and it shows.

Gaming Review summary:

Graphics 4.5/5
Audio 4/5
Gameplay 4.5/5
Features 4/5

Weighted Score: 93%

EHR - MAH -GHERD!

This has to be one of the best gaming experiences I've written about to date (although there isn't many) .. This game .... Buy it!

Game Dev Tycoon

So.. Steam, Greenlight.. what's it all about?

Well, It seems it's a platform developed by people that sell games for people that make games to sell games to people that buy games on a platform designed to sell games.

I think...


Whatever it is or is not, recently my 'Steam' home page shoved into my face a title by the name of 'Game Dev Tycoon'

It had isometric quasi-cartoon graphics, and as such I HAD to buy it.

Thankfully what I found was a game that quite well suits my sometimes casual and highly non-committal play style, very much in the same genre as games like 'theme park' you, the player, act as a omniscient controller capable of domineering your will absolute.

While the game itself is quite enjoyable if somewhat repetitive there are some things which I personally think could be improved upon...

Time For A Breakdown!

Graphics:

Not really a strong part of this game, the animations are limited in scope and the general appearance of the game is very static, I'd like to see the little folk perhaps get up for a walk to the vending machines, or take some time out in the chill-out staff area... instead they sit there like good little zombie-droids, even when they are sent on holiday, their zombie-droid-ghost remains sat at the desk.

The best thing I can say about the graphics (and by extension the U.I ) is that it is functional and uncluttered, the controls are easy to navigate even if sometimes they menu system isn't quite as click-responsive as I'd like to to be.

What you'll spend most of your game time staring at...

Sound:

I have very little to say about this.. but that's because there is VERY little to comment on, much like the graphics the sound is functional and fit for purpose, the little folk make blippy noises as they go about their work and background noise is unoffencive if somewhat utterly forgettable / ignored.

Gameplay:

Quite frankly, not a lot really happens during game play, the player interacts with some slide-bar menus, and occasionally clicks a few on screen menu options, but generally a well trained gibbon would be able to perform the tasks required to 'play' the game,

The intricacy comes from the thought process of making the choices for your burgeoning games company, there's quite a scope of options to run through, and managing distribution of workload is far from what many would consider fun, but oddly, in this game... it becomes a challenge not a chore, and overcoming that challenge is somewhat rewarding to the player, a sense of general achievement.

All in all it's an enjoyable procrastination tool, but due to it's limited scope even a dedicated or completionist die-hard fan of this genre will find it becomes all too repetitive, I've found myself in a trance like state while playing this game, not so much enjoying it per-se merely operating it for the fact that it is there to be operated.

Round It Up;

It's a curious game, and it's designers have clearly put a lot of effort into things, so I congratulate them for that, I'll be eager to see if there are any revisions made which add some spice to the dish they've served but fro now this is clearly a Tuna & Cucumber sandwich type of game, enjoyable for what it is despite the fact you really wanted an Angus burger with Monterey jack cheese and all the trimmings...

Gaming Review summary:

Graphics 3/5

Audio 3/5

Gameplay 4/5

Features 2/5

Weighted Score: 54%

Passable Time-Sponge. Far from what I would consider a well polished game, but for what it lacks it's enjoyable enough to overlook the shortcomings, and for what it costs a worthwhile casual game.

Payday 2

Wait ... payday 2? what about the first one!?

Well put simply Payday, is quite long in the tooth now. So I skipped straight to number 2. to get to the juicy review...

CLICK HERE

there's a little pre-amble before I get to the review proper.

The Payday Premise

The whole idea behind Payday, is very simple, it follows in the same idea as Left4Dead, the players, of which there are a small number in any game. Limited to 4 persons per game, find themselves faced with a high volume of enemies that  must be violently dealt with in order to succeed.

These enemies are in theory limitless, so you can't simply kill everything, and then move on, instead, players have to find ways to maximise their in game characters effect and work with other players in order to be successful with a good outcome.

In payday, the roles of protagonist and antagonist are somewhat reversed, the players find themselves in the role of professional thief, and the hordes of enemies are the city police which attend their crime scene. the idea being that the players must complete a heist obtaining the best payout possible, while defending themselves and resisting arrest.

Pure Escapism

Let me stress that this game is all about a little fun role-play, we all as children would play cops n' robbers yelling bang at each other running about like lunatics, and this game allows adults to experience that once again, albeit in rendered 3d with surround effects. 

None the less this game is probably one abhorred by the groups that insist (to the contrary of studies) that video games promote violence and parody of in game events, but that's not what this review is about... I wanted to recognise this detail, but not argue it out here and now.

There's even a little in-game reference to this real-world complaint, just check out this screen capture!

Cops n' Robbers

The new Payday 2 expands on the first game, which I found to be great fun, now it adds extra layers of stealth, tactical planning and character skills which aid the team as a whole. there's a diverse selection of weapons to acquire and modify with 'bonus' items and a nice little touch whereby your 'robbery mask' can be modified to how you'd like it to look.

One of the core and most recognisable parts of Payday was the fact the characters all wore clown masks, and now, players get to repaint, and design their mask (or alternative masks they may find) to bring a rather nice level of personalisation to the game, making the player more involved.

Graphically, this game hits the marks, to paraphrase... it has good depth of focus effects and adequate texture / model handling to maintain an engrossment in the action without breaking the fourth wall. the player is 'watching' from a 1st person perspective and everything that happens visually really melds well.

I've seen a few blip's and glitches (such as warp-factor 9 police officers, and the occasional FBI agent that can phase through solid objects) but the game is still in beta at the time I write this, so there's plenty of room for loose ends to be tied up.

The sounds, well as is the way with any well budgeted game these days, there isn't anything I can fault, it goes bang pop and whiz as is appropriate all keeping the immersion intact.

Grab Some Friends! Get To Work.

This game is all about the co-op, the AI partners absolutely stink, but the whole idea is that you get together with your pals and have a blast, the harder difficulties require a well formed group that can all work in sync really pushing people to work together and not playing the lone-wolf style of play.

Sadly some of the 'drop in' players seem to treat this game like it is call of duty or some other equally forgiving game, but this game is not forgiving, and I like that.. not only is it possible to fail, it's highly probable. That is why I love Payday, you have to play hard, to achieve the rewards, nothing is given to the player... If you want to earn big cash, you're gonna have to work for it.

Gaming Review summary:

Graphics 4/5

Audio 5/5

Gameplay 5/5

Features 4/5

Weighted Score: 90%

Fantastic Encore
of a game I already appreciated for it's approach to co-op gaming, this adds so much to make it even better!

Battletech Ahoy!

I'm a big fan of Battletech, Mechwarrior and in general the whole franchise... So the appearance of a new game that boasts a close relation to the tabletop game really interested me.

I chose to sign up into the beta testing or 'founders club' a nominal fee paid such that I can get access to the game before it reaches the wider public audience. So far, it's been really good fun. While I am a little irked that there is only a limited selection of in game assets with which to tinker with, but I'm sure the developers will pump more detail into the game as it grows.

The game plays as a turn by turn expression of the players moves and choices, each turn acted out simultaneously in a short video to draw the players into the action, considering the subject matter and the fact that the game is a very slow paced affair when played in it's table top incarnation, to make things exciting and more quickly paced. And it's been done well.

Due to the NDA I have to commit to as part of the beta sign-up agreement I cannot relay too much in form of actual detail, but I can say it's worth the pennies. The strategy elements don't require a Mensa test to engage with, the sounds of explosions and stomping mechs' all help keep the user involved in the action as the visuals portray the multi-ton battle machines lobbing ordinance across vast battlefields.

There are a few niggles in the user interface, and some features which I'd be eager to see included from battletech, but it's relatively early days and from what I've seen the developers are working hard at making real effort to get things right.

If you're a fan of the tabletop game, or even if you're a disheartened turn-based PC gamer that has been left in the dark by developer houses determined to make everything into an FPS game perhaps this could be the new thing you've been looking for.

More detail of this game can be found here:
https://mwtactics.com/game

If you're so interested then you can even test it yourself here:
https://mwtactics.com/founders/

To sum things up a little, a good tactical game, with a lot of potential for the future, keeping turn-based gaming alive in a time of banal first-person shooters.

Gaming Review summary:

Graphics 4/5

Audio 3/5

Gameplay 4/5

Features 2/5

Weighted Score: 68%

Enjoyable, Visual feast of turn-based strategy. A well presented game, the scores based only on my experience and most likely would be improved upon the final release of the 'finished' game.

Diablo 3, Error 37

Diablo 3.

So, several years ago (yes I'm old.. deal with it!) I played Diablo (originally on my Playstation, and then later on PC) I waged war against those oh so pixelated daemons for many a happy hour in my youth, When D2, and it shall for me always be referred to as D2, but for sake of reference, I'm talking about Diablo 2 and the  Lord Of Destruction expansion pack; when this game came about I was more excited than a chihuahua on crack being told it's walkies time! my friends and I gored our way through that game like no other, and I could not even begin to hazard a guess at how many hours I played.

So, With the (at this point historical) arrival of Diablo 3 I became anxious of a repeat of sleepless nights and dungeon crawling, searching for that next weapon drop, or grinding a level for experience. Sadly I think I have been let down a little in that respect... Even the title of this blog points to one of the major flaws which was (now solved... mostly) bane to thousands of players: The game has to have an active internet connection at all times, even for solo play. For the best part of its early life players could not log in to the game and were presented with Error 37 .. So a game which cost players upward of £40 they couldn't play because of severe technical fault.

Diablo 3 presents a very simplified interface, indeed gone is any interaction based around character 'levelling' instead replaced by automatic character sheet adjustment and a 'single choice' .. and a choice that can later be altered if you so choose, of skill point.

The interface and game play has also been dumbed down or perhaps more politically correctly simplified with a meagre 4 action keys replacing essentially what was the entire row of player determinable action keys.

The inventory too saw a break down to a more basic role, now the player has one inventory which serves all of their characters, previously each character would have space of their own in which to stash stuff.

I could continue for several point more each detailing how the game seems to have been stripped down until only the required base parts are left...  but lets focus on something more upbeat:

This is a very different game from Diablo 2, but, with a bunch of mates and several hours to dedicate to the game it's easy to get sucked into the world of D3... Even if it is stacked with reference to the previous games like some aged grandfather regaling for the 60th time about how he met the queen once. It does have its charms, but the character progression reaches a plateau all to quickly and game-play becomes quite stale.

All in all, a great fantasy romp, and as far as button bashers go, it's still got good merit quite frankly.. read the scores and my summary below I think it sums things up nicely...

Gaming Review summary:

Graphics 4/5

Audio 4/5

Gameplay 3/5

Features 3/5

Weighted Score: 64%

Disappointing and forgettable modern take on a game franchise which I had nothing but massive respect for previously.

Fallen, but its not Out.

Fallout 3: New Vegas.

Let me open this review by stating that I pretty much despised Fallout 3, It was to me a passionate fan of the original fallout games an abomination. First person, dumbed down and less transparent than a window in a glass of crystal clear water being suspended by a fishing line against a back drop of invisible things.

Until the community at large (thank you Nexus!) was capable of correcting pretty much everything about the game, it was a shocking game that presented no challenge or any hope of playability, let alone re-playability.

Now.. onto the main attraction.

Fallout: New Vegas

Essentially the same game engine but thankfully my VERY first impression... "this is more of a challenge" which is a good thing. The game content (even though I'd purchased the DLC all at the off) was much better, more varied and seemingly more intricate. Another good thing.

Having played the game extensively and for a considerable amount of man-hours I can conclude that there isn't a thing in this game that was 'wrong' ... I have modded the game to my personal tastes, adding extra items and tweaking things (the native level of 'darkness' at night was far from what could be perceived as 'dark') but the things that I've modded in are simply adding to an already enjoyable experience.

My one BIG critique of this game, and probably games in which this feature is used is the enemy level scaling. I oppose the fact that as my character progresses so should the toughness of the enemies which I face, this leads to game breaking occurrences, shooting an unarmored tribal in the Honest Hearts with a high caliber weapon several times and having to reload to then shoot him again... seems utterly ridiculous. In my humble opinion, as I progress my character and I acquire more powerful weapons the enemies which were once a threat to me should become by comparison less of a threat over time.

The rate at which the character progressed was well matched, but with the DLC I've found that I've reached max level and now feel stifled as there is still game to explore but now I feel i'm not getting reward for action.

I have had many hours of game-play from Fallout: New Vegas and once I've finally completed my 1st and very thorough play through I can even see myself enjoying the game a 2nd time.

Graphically the game is far from what could be considered eye-candy, but it has moments where I find myself enjoying the vistas that are presented, the character animation etc again is a high quality, but often there are little graphical fuck-ups that break the immersion.

Same goes for the sound really, guns go bang.. bad guys go grrrr etc etc hardly an audio treat but perfectly fitting of the function.

Gaming Review summary:

Graphics 4/5

Audio 3/5

Gameplay 5/5

Features 4/5

Weighted Score: 90%

Excellent rejuvenation of what I considered a franchise destroyed by modernization, well worth the investment.

LOL .. thats not funny

LOL... Leary old Llama .. Lots of Love.. League of Legends! Clicky for more

This is a fantastic little game, deep strategy, tactical, fun, and all presented in a rather cartoon style. I'm not sure how to describe the game itself, the most generalized description I could give is... destroy the enemy base before they destroy yours!

The games are played on very simplistic maps, which as far as I am aware never differ. BUT the familiarity of the maps leads to the tactical use of their assets. You the player play as a 'champion' each champion has a huge and varied array of abilities something for all styles of play. each game starts as the 'minions' spawn these minions are computer controlled basic units they wander toward the enemy base and attack anything they don't like along the way in the most simplistic form of punchy or uninteresting magical way they see fit... likewise the enemy base spawns its own minions which head to your base with similar intent.

Between each base is an array of defensive towers, It's in the best interest of the player champions not to be near these as they tend to lead to death. All deaths are dealt with a timed respawn, and the longer the game goes on the longer the respawn time.

So, the players have to navigate enemy minions... fight off the enemy champions, take out the towers and finally destroy the opposed base.. simple! ... yes it is, however it's VERY good fun and usually a game can be completed within an hour, so it doesn't take up your entire evening to play.

The graphics are nice and each champion is well detailed and has extra skins available for even more variety (more on that later...) the scenery is suited and it all melds together well, the sounds are good, lots of bashing, slicing and magical noises to help your ears enjoy the game. If I were to say any one criticism of all this.. the cartoony graphics are a little gaudy for my personal taste... but not so much it spoils the game for me.

One last point. I mentioned the extra skins. If you find yourself taken with a given character skin. It will cost you real cash to buy it (virtual goods/micro-transactions) However... this is no bad thing. The game itself is 100% free to play and you need never spend a single penny to enjoy playing it. More importantly the micro-transactional side of things has NO bearing on game play so, there is no artificial edge to be gained through transactions. Personally For a game of this caliber to be entirely free is really quite fantastic!

Don't yet have a League of Legends account? try it now! 

Click Here to start your new obsession!

Gaming Review summary:

Graphics 4/5

Audio 4/5

Gameplay 4/5

Features 5/5

Weighted Score: 87%

Snooze Rating: Considering the price... Why don't you already have this!

Call Of Duty; (specifically...) world at war.

I first found out about call of duty some time ago when the press and forums all over were raving about CoD modern warfare, until this point I was happily oblivious to the series, I played CoD:MW (oft referred to as cawwadoody) and generally enjoyed the experience, however I'd like to bring to the attention of the public, and games designers, and anyone silly enough to still be reading this the game 'World At War' ...

After playing cawwadoody I had found a game that I enjoyed and thought I'd spread my wings a little so, WaW was logically the next step in my choosing (cawwadoody MW2 not yet released...)

The game is to say the least a repetitive and unrewarding experience, visually quite nice, but lacks the 'soul' required. I feel utterly detached from the characters and even more blasé about any non-main character, which I think is a damnable shame, the game is portraying some of the darkest moments in human history and I would hope that it brings forward some feeling of humbleness as well as being entertaining (it is after all... a game)

let's cut to the crux of the matter... the A.I and the poorly executed game experience. (yes this review is mostly based around the single player, but in my eyes, all these games play nearly exactly the same as one another in the multi-player)

A.I faults
Non-supportive
I run forward to get to a nice bit of cover hoping my AI pals will provide some level of supporting fire, or perhaps move to positions which will take advantage of my own new vantage... nope, not happening, the stiffly scripted AI will happily duck behind cover and THEN fire and fails to move unless the player has reached a very specific point. This leads to an ever growing amount of meta-game wherein the player is taught not about the fluidity and movement of a WW2 battlefield, but instead that he must reach point X on the current map.

Idiotic
I flank to a position which allows me greater command of the battle, in doing so I hit magical point X (as discussed above...) and my AI pals happily run passed enemies to take up their new positions, the worst example of this being when I turned around  to see about half a dozen enemy well behind our line and as my new AI pals were spawning they'd happily run straight passed them and get shot down.

Un-responsive
Its painfully clear that for all their yelling and gun noises, I may as well be utterly alone, I cannot count the number of times I've completed a map in this game in which 95% of the enemy targets were killed by me, this frustrates me on so many levels.. if a game has AI bots I expect them to have some fucking impact on things.

On the higher difficulty levels the friendly AI seems useless to the point that it often becomes a hindrance more than any form of help. I've died more than once when at the edge of cover to take shots I try to move back into cover and Private Dumb-fucker-not-moving stands blankly looking into the distance stopping me from moving backward as I'm peppered with gunfire or.. god forbid... grenades.

Grenades
Every Japanese and Nazi infantryman carries no less than 3000 grenades and can throw with perfect accuracy up to 700 yards 3 or 4 in quick succession with inch perfect target landing. To me one of the most broken parts of the game is this. I enjoy a challenge, really I do, but there is a not so fine line between challenge and just outright WTF often I would find that 6 grenades would land ON my face as I am moving ,completely obscured, behind cover. 2 would push me to 'challenge' my reactions.. 3 would test me further both in my reactions and my ability to quickly assess a safe place to run to but when 4 (and often many more than 4 grenades are landing at my exact position often in literal waves of grenade spam... well Fuck that, its not challenging, its not fun and only adds to the ever frustrating re-spawn.

which leads nicely to my final gripe,

Checkpoints
while I agree such things are needed in a game that plays like this one, whoever decided how to lay out the checkpoints in this game needs to be fired. Too often I found myself at a position in the game thinking, this would be a good checkpoint .. but its not, and on the flip-side I recall one mission where I passed 3 checkpoints in VERY quick succession while I crossed some open ground with no enemy around.

Its fair to point out not every level suffers from these faults, but they are overwhelmingly apparent when they do show up. there were a few occasions where I actually found myself enthralled by the game but not often or long enough that the game was what I'd call enjoyable

Gaming Review summary:

Graphics 4/5

Audio 4/5

Gameplay 2/5

Features 1/5

Weighted Score: 30%

Snooze Rating: There are MUCH better games available, get one of those.

Conflict: Denied Ops

Before I go any further, some background on this... I purchased C:Do (Conflict: Denied Ops) based purely on experience of games in the same series; Firstly I played conflict: (hereafter shorted to C: with appropriate acronym for the game) Desert Storm 2 (C:DS2), I found if cheap in my local game store one day, and thought I'd give it a go and soon found that I enjoyed it greatly! The mix of FPS and 'tactical' or tactiCool manoeuvre really hits my button so much so, before I'd even finished the game I went and found a copy of the original game C:Desert Storm (C:DS).

Considering I purchased these games well after their 'technical' ability had been surpassed, their game play enthralled me. The fire and manoeuvre, the tactical placing and the small squad with a good mix of character abilities made these games a 1^st class experience, soon after, now hooked on the conflict series, I bought C:Vietnam, a personal favourite genre in FPS games and again this game gave me an adrenaline busting gaming experience, as I was making my way through the Jungles of Vietnam, the Studio behind the Conflict games (Pivotal Games / Eidos) announced a NEW title, I pre-ordered it and awaited with baited breath, not only was it more of what I loved, they were introducing a co-op multi-player experience, C:Global Storm (also known as Global Terror) my pals with which I regularly played LAN games with were all so taken with my passion for the game series that they too pre-ordered a copy each! This game was by far and away, some of the best fun I've had in multi-player gaming.

Some reference to the series: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_(series)

So... now that you understand WHY I decided to buy C:DO, let me go on to explain, using the above as the reason(s) why so far.. I am incredibly disappointed. Firstly, the pace of the game is wrong. ALL the previous titles demanded good use of the cover, complete with intuitive cover systems, They demanded use of the team as a whole, each member felt needed, be it the sniper, the gunner, the demo guy or the team leader (team leader was generally an 'all-round' character) and this lead to co-ordinated attacks, flanking events stealth with covering fire diversionary tactics in-fact, just everything I could dream of from a tactical shooter.

C:DO however does NOT have this, instead they cut the team to 2 men (the same development studio that released the much vaunted Kane & Lynch games...) and these 2 men, really only 1 makes much sense to use, the gunner, excepting the few real occasions where the snipers scope is required, the thinking has been taken away entirely... and so has the AI.

Now I can pick up and play C:DO just blazing away with a machine gun like John Rambo, on the screen the action is completely devoid of any feel for what’s actually going on. The AI haplessly runs directly into your gunfire, where previously I recall actually being caught off guard by the AI in C:GS and also C:V, now the enemy are nothing more than rag-doll physics waiting to happen.

Technically the game appeals well enough, sure, its far from Crysis 2 on full being run on 16 graphics cards in parallel, but I don't have any such gaming rig, I play on a rather humble pc which is only just capable of playing modern titles, and as such this game passes most requirements, some of the games assets look awkward and poorly modelled. The worst part of the graphics is that they seem not to have advanced much from previous titles where other games are pushing boundaries of graphical impact C:DO seems like it has graphics made for a couple years of so ago.

Sounds fit the bill well enough, 'booom' … 'peeyooww' the usual mix of standard FPS noises, the voices are nothing to write home about but fit well enough. There's not much to say really I suppose this is one area which at least doesn't disappoint me!

Summary, this game takes a good few steps back, the gameplay is 'frantic' but simply uninspired, If you want a budget shooter that has co-op feature, bypass this, try Conflict: Global Storm it's superior in almost every way.

I will point out am yet to complete this game... if I do I may return with more uplifting comments, but I think i may simply loose interest in the game and do something more productive with my time.

Gaming Review summary:

Graphics 3/5

Audio 4/5

Gameplay 2/5

Features 2/5

Weighted Score: 32%

Snooze Rating: Don't bother with this!

Welcome to Snooze Reviews

Welcome to this, my online take on everything from restaurants, to hotels, from laptops, to movies. whatever I happen to be interested in I'll try to forward a level headed review of it, so, watch this space for gadgets, gizmo's travels and other random interventions!

I'll also be bouncing review 'points' from my long suffering girlfriend, she's not shy of sharing her opinion!