Best of 2009: Batman: Arkham Asylum

Maybe I should preface this with the disclaimer that I am a gigantic Batman nerd.  I have been since I was about 3 years old, and my love for the Dark Knight has only grown stronger.  And I should also explain that we Batman fans have had to slog through terrible Batman game after terrible game, just hoping that the next one will be good.  So with all that being said, I LOVE THIS GAME!!!

OK, let's scale back from that freak out.  From what I've read, you don't have to be a Batman fan to enjoy this game.  It's just a really good game.  But I believe that being a Batman fan makes it even that much better, because when you're playing it, the atmosphere, the characters, the story, and the controls all just feel right.  This truly feels like a Batman experience from top to bottom.  For the first time, a video game developer has made a game where you actually feel like you are the Batman. 

A huge thing working in Arkham Asylum's favor is the cast for the voice work.  Kevin Conroy is reprising his role as Batman.  If that isn't enough to excite you, I demand that you go and watch Batman: The Animated Series.  Right now.  Seriously, stop reading this and go watch an episode.  I'll wait.  ...OK, you back?  The guy voicing Batman in that episode you just watched?  That's Kevin Conroy.  That's why I was so happy he was involved in this.  He is Batman in my mind.  That is how Batman sounds.  And adding to that, in the role of the Joker, we have the one and only Mark Hammil.  Yup, Luke Skywalker.  But his ultimate role for me will always be the Joker, as that dates back to the Animated Series as well.  I think they got a few other voices from the cartoon in there, so most of the cast sounds the way I'm used to hearing them talk.  That's a big deal when the developer is trying to sell you on an authentic Batman experience.

Yet the great voice work could only carry the game so far.  If the cast had terrible lines or unnatural dialogue, then none of those guys could really salvage this game.  Yet the characters all behave and act the way you would expect Batman characters to.  I have to imagine a lot of credit goes toward Paul Dini.  Who is Paul Dini, you ask?  Why, he was one of the main writers on Batman: The Animated Series!  Yeah, you might be able to tell by now that I'm kind of crazy about that show.  But I'm crazy about it for a good reason.  It was a kid's show that didn't dumb down the characters for it's audience.  In fact, I think the writers had a better feel for Batman and his world than some of the comic writers creating the "official continuity".  The writers on that show had an obvious love for the Batman, and the way they told his adventures just clicked well.  That was the way Batman should act.  He wasn't too brooding, yet he still had a burden about him that compelled him to keep fighting.  This carries over to the game.  Paul Dini was one of the main writers, and I have to believe he brought over his experience from the cartoon and was able to give it just a slightly darker and more mature tone.  Not too much, but enough to make you feel like you were really in Batman's world and trying to bring down this circus of homicidal maniacs.

But this is a video game here.  And if the game play is no good, then all the other stuff is just a waste of time.  Thankfully, the gameplay is great and fits perfectly into a Batman game.  Combat in this game is not about surviving each encounter, as is usually the focus.  This is Batman, and if some random thugs can give him a real fight, then he might as well hang up the cape and cowl.  The Batman in Arkham Asylum can not only take on twenty thugs at a time, but he can theoretically take them out without taking a single hit.  That's the draw of the combat in this game: you try to dismantle each group of bad guys in the most awesome way possible.  It seems really simple at the start, but you soon become addicted to stringing together attacks, counters, and special attacks to keep the combos going and see if you can make it out flawlessly.  It's incredibly fun, and makes Batman seem like the awesome superhero you know from the comics and movies.  This is only enhanced by the stealth portions of the game.  Stealth in games is usually about making you feel like the prey, and hiding to survive.  In Batman, it's almost the opposite.  Batman can only take a few hits, since these guys have guns and he only has body armor, but you still get the feeling that Batman is the predator in these moments.  You slowly take each goon out, one by one.  When another one drops, the remaining guys get more and more freaked out, until you finally bring them all down to the ground.  You often do this with the aid of Batman's gadgets, which all feel useful and are vital in exploring the Asylum.  As you progress, you get better gadgets and upgrades that allow you to retrack your steps and discover new areas and items.  Yes, this is a Metroid-vania game.  The backtracking is kept to a minimum, though, so you always feel like you're moving forward.

In the end, Batman: Arkham Asylum is a game that effectively puts you in Batman's shoes and allows you to feel how awesome it is to be the Dark Knight.  Rocksteady has created an incredibly fun game and put it in a great atmosphere with a story that fits well within the Batman world.  If you're not a fan of Batman, there's still plenty of stuff in here for you to enjoy.  If you are a fan, well you probably already know all this, since you've likely played and beaten it by now.  And it was great, wasn't it?  Yeah it was.

Best of 2009: Assassin's Creed 2

This game could win any number of awards from me this year.  Most Surprising, Most Improved, and Best Use of Renaissance Art come to mind.  It also was one of my favorite games of the year.  I really didn't expect to be saying that before the game came out.  The original Assassin's Creed was a good game, and I enjoyed playing it, but it had some serious issues that really kept me from holding it in any kind of high regard.  Dialogue and missions repeated themselves far too often.  The beggars were the definition of annoying.  And worst of all were the drunk/slash insane people who only ever seemed to have a problem with your character.  Everyone else they let be, but when you came around, they came out swinging.  Maybe they all just really resented dudes with white robes and swords on their hips?  That's a weird kind of guy to pick a fight with, but I'm not going to judge them.  I'm just going to grab them and toss them into the street.  The story also left something to be desired, as they established a large fiction for their universe and then failed to satisfactorily resolve any of it.  Altair's story was left on a cliffhanger, Desmond remained a captive, and you still had no idea what the heck was really going on.  Altair, your protagonist for the majority of the game, was also extremely unlikable for most of the game, which made it hard to want to keep controlling him.

Thankfully, Assassin's Creed 2 fixes almost all of these issues.  The story is far more interesting this time, and it moves at a far better pace.  You feel like there is more variety to what you can do.  Ezio Auditore, the protagonist this time around, is far more likable, interesting, and sympathetic.  The world seems more engrossing too, filled with Italian Renaissance art and key individuals of the period.  All in all, it just was far more fun to play.

The original split its time between Desmond in the real world and Altair in the Animus a fair amount.  I'd say it was about 75% Altair, 25% Desmond.  Well in the sequel you spend closer to 95% with Ezio and 5% with Desmond, and yet the overall story with Desmond actually seems to take a larger role.  You finally get to find out more about the crazy conspiracy theory, Dan Brown style backdrop to the Assassin's Creed world.  In fact, I think my favorite parts of the game were hunting down the glyphs that are scattered around Italy.  When you find one, you delve into history and get to see their spin on how world events went down.  Then you get a segment of a weird video that features naked people running.  I'm not kidding.  And when you finally get to control Desmond again, it leads to one of the more surreal yet stunning moments in the game.  Not to mention one of the best ending credit segments in video game history.

I loved most of the side stuff you could do in the game.  Whenever I would unlock a district, I would immediately go scale every view point so I could find new codex pages, then get Leonardo Da Vinci to translate them, then go exchange whatever cash I could for paintings so I could return to my home base and pay an architect to improve my villa so I could make even more cash to upgrade my armor and weapons.  Plus, you get to display the paintings in your house, which makes you feel all kinds of snobbish.  Then you can also find tombs that you have to navigate so you can find pieces of Altair's ultimate armor, and these areas are where the control scheme works the best.  In the open world, it's a bit more frustrating, as Ezio will often leap to his doom when you really wanted him to jump onto a balcony or wire.  Despite that, the navigation still seems more elegant and streamlined than the original game, so chalk that up as another improvement.  There's always an incentive to continue on with the story, though, which is more streamlined and interesting than the original.  Instead of just pursuing a list of targets like in the first game, this time the assassinations have more weight and backstory to them.  You always feel like you're moving forward in the game and getting closer to some answers.  It also helps that the game looks fantastic, with stunning recreations of areas like Florence, Tuscany, and Venice.  After playing this game, I really would love to take a trip to Italy and visit these places in person, because this game makes them look beautiful.


One of my only real gripes with the game is that it's almost required to play the original first.  I want to recommend that you go out immediately and buy this game, but if you haven't played the first one, you may get pretty confused as to what's going on.  It lays down a bit of backstory at the start, but not nearly enough to get you up to speed on Desmond, the Templars, and the Assassins.  Plus, there is a significant moment in the game that showcases a character that was very obscure in the first game.  I wouldn't be surprised if some of the people who have played the first one didn't even know who that person was.  And I don't really want to recommend you play the original since this new one is so superior in every way.  Maybe you'd be better off reading Wikipedia or watching some videos on YouTube to get caught up on the story, and then play Assassin's Creed 2.

Assassin's Creed 2 was a game that I was far from caring about before it was released, and yet now I'm counting it as one of my favorites of the year.  This is a testament to the quality and polish that the team over at Ubisoft put into the game, and now I can't wait for the next chapter.  This is how sequels should be made.

Best of 2009: Modern Warfare 2

Honestly, I don't know what to write about Modern Warfare 2.  The now "Call of Duty"-less franchise pretty much speaks for itself.  If you don't know what this game is all about, then you probably don't care enough to have me explain it to you.  And the rest of you already know.  I wouldn't be surprised if you were reading this while waiting for the next round of Headquarters to load up.  Still, I might as well talk about some of my personal thoughts on this enormously popular sequel.

The multiplayer is solid.  But I don't really care about multiplayer in almost any game.  That stuff is rarely for me.  The fact that I want to play competitive multiplayer in Modern Warfare 2 at all is a testament in itself as to how good it is.  Unfortunately, I'm not very good at it.  I'll play it in short spurts, rack up a bunch of deaths, occasionally see my rank go up, and then call it a night.  Still, nothing can top the disbelief I felt when someone on my team actually killed enough guys to drop the nuclear bomb.  I guess it's not so rare anymore, but that first time was pretty crazy.  There's also a co-op mode that's supposed to be really good, but I haven't actually played any of it, so I can't really speak about that at all.

So let's talk about the story.  I'm not going to go into spoilers, but I thought it was pretty awesome.  I also thought it was incredibly ridiculous.  It's been said a thousand times already, but Modern Warfare 2 abandons the almost feasible story elements of Modern Warfare and goes for a completely insane Red Dawn scenario.  Add to that a whole bunch of confusing stuff with your British counterparts, and you've got an almost incomprehensible plot.  However, Infinity Ward can immerse you in a game almost unlike anyone else, so you don't care that none of this really makes any sense.  You care about the dudes trying to kill you as you race through the streets of Rio and pray you get to the chopper on time.  You care about surviving the snowmobile chase.  You care about working your way through Afghanistan while both sides of a conflict are out for your blood.  And you care that Soap MacTavish is one of the biggest badasses that's ever been put on your screen.  While Modern Warfare 2 may not have the same impact and game-changing effects as its predecessor, it still packs one heck of a punch and is one incredible ride from start to finish.

Best of 2009: Torchlight

This is a $20 game that I'm loving more than most of the $60+ juggernauts released this year.  That alone earns Torchlight a spot on the list.  I'm actually surprised that Torchlight has hooked my heart as effectively as it has.  I generally prefer games with a strong story element.  It doesn't have to be symbolic or weighed down with those ever so popular "moral choices" that seem to be hot these days, but I do usually prefer a well told story to mindless gameplay.  The story is absolutely secondary in Torchlight, though.  It exists, but it's mainly just there as an excuse for why you're delving ever deeper into this long dungeon underneath the town.  Yet the gameplay is so well executed and addicting that it's kept me coming back time and again.

If you've ever played Diablo, you know exactly what you're getting here.  The game was actually designed by the guys who made Diablo, so they kind of know what they're doing with a game of this type.  You may get a creepy sense of deja vu when you play Torchlight, as the music is almost the same as that of Diablo's Tristam.  And since these guys made Diablo, they also know what needed to be improved upon in that classic, and they did a phenomenal job here.  The loot drops are plentiful, yet the meaningful ones are spaced far enough apart to make them feel special.  Combat is a blast, with powers that I'm actually using a lot so I don't just feel like I'm endlessly hammering on the mouse button.  The art style is colorful and cartoony, which is actually a nice contrast from the dark and demonic mood of the Diablo series.  But the greatest improvement is the pet.  No matter what class you choose, you will have either a dog or a cat accompany you.  This pet will fight alongside you.  You can assign it spells and give it accessories to boost its stats.  It has inventory space.  And best of all, you can send it into town to sell all the loot it's carrying while you continue to quest through the dungeon.  For anyone who has been frustrated in a Diablo game by the constant breaks in the game needed to activate a town portal and sell some loot, this is one of the greatest ideas ever conceived by a game developer. 

I haven't finished the game yet, but it's one of those games you can jump in and play for a little or a long time.  That's part of why I love this game so much.  I don't feel like I need to jump back in before I forget everything, yet I still feel drawn to hop in every now and then.  It's kind of like WOW, only without the monthly fees and the annoying people cluttering your chat window.  In other words, it's fantastic.

Best and Worst of 2009: Honorable Mentions

Ah, the Honorable Mentions.  I wanted to limit myself to a top five list this year, so these are the games that I really enjoyed, but didn't quite make it on the list.  And to be fair, a lot of these are games that I just haven't gotten around to finishing or playing yet, so they could feasibly be on the top list.  But the top five are the games I couldn't stop playing, so that's why they stand out over the rest (well, with the exception of tomorrow's game, but I love it so much that I just couldn't exclude it from the top 5).  So while those are the best, these are all pretty darn good too.  So let's get down to honorably mentioning:


Best Professor Layton Game - Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box


I think the odds were stacked in the Diabolical Box's favor, as there was only one Professor Layton game this year (at least in America...).  Still, this is a Professor Layton game, and it's fantastic.  If you never played the first one, go get it!  What are you waiting for?!  Well, unless you don't own a DS.  Anyways, if you played the Curious Village, you know what to expect here.  There aren't any new tricks, but I wasn't expecting there to be.  I wanted more of the same, and this delivered.  There is a great sense of charm in these games, and some pretty mind bending puzzles as well.  If you have a DS, pick it up and help the Professor solve his puzzles and aid strangers by brewing them tea.  Yes, that happens.  Plus, and I don't want to spoil anything here, but you get to see the Professor flex his fencing skills.  And believe me, they are formidable.  If that doesn't sell you on it, then I don't want to know you.  Because you must be a bad person.

Best Downloadable Game - Shadow Complex 

I should really clear up that this is for games made specifically for download on the consoles, seeing as I bought almost every single PC game this year via Steam.  This was a great year for XBLA and PSN games, I have to say.  Splosion Man, Trials HD, and so on made for a really great selection.  But the stand out game of them all was Shadow Complex.  Shadow Complex raised the bar for what you expect from a XBLA game, providing an experience that outshone most of the big budget retail games.  This is a "Metrodvania" style game, where you wander a large 2D overworld and pick up new weapons and powerups that allow you to explore new areas of the map.  Yet I still felt like this was progressing the whole formula as well.  The story is pretty forgettable, but the gameplay is terrific.  And I have to mention that the end sequence ranks among my favorite final battles ever.  When you're fully upgraded, you can take on the world, and you practically do.  They throw everything at you, and yet you can destroy it all effortlessly.  It really feels rewarding after the time invested in the game.  It also has Nolan North voicing the lead, which will raise any game a notch in my book.

Best PS3 Exclusive Open World Super Power Game - Infamous

OK, so I really just wanted to talk about Infamous.  Infamous is a really fun game that kind of wears out its welcome near the end.  It gets really hard and chaotic at points, and the story doesn't ever really resolve anything.  It's one of those games that was built with a franchise in mind.  When did that mean you couldn't tell a complete story in your game?  Why do they all have to basically say "To Be Continued" at the end?  It totally feels like someone cheated you out of a portion of your $60 game!  Regardless, this game is a ton a fun anyways, as I lost a ton of hours running around the city and zapping dudes.  Sucker Punch continues to deliver the goods.  While I would have loved to see them continue with the Sly Cooper series, this is a great new world and idea that they've made.  The movement feels right, the powers are pretty cool, and the story is pretty interesting, even despite the aforementioned aggravations in the last third of the game.  But whatever.  I still had a blast with it.  Or I guess you could say I got a "charge" out of it!  Heh...heh...OK, I'm sorry.  I couldn't resist.

Best Use of Jack Black - Brutal Legend

Brutal Legend is a funny game with decent gameplay that I've played very little of.  With all the great games coming out, I've had very little incentive to go back to it.  Still, Tim Schafer is probably the funniest guy writing games these days, and he keeps it up with this one.  Jack Black actually enhances the experience, bringing just the right tone and attitude to the character of Eddie Riggs.  I could have seen them going over the top and insane when they locked down Jack Black, but they managed to hold off and create something pretty cool.  Maybe someday I'll actually go see the rest of his story.

Best Racing Game - Dirt 2

So apparently I like Rally racing now?  I guess.  I don't want to watch it, but I've sure enjoyed playing it.  I'm not that big into racing games anymore, but Dirt 2 brings some interesting gameplay and combines it with a fantastic presentation.  This game looks beautiful, and it makes me wish I was actually good at driving from the cockpit view.  You also have to think when you turn, and compensate for the dirt roads.  But if you screw up and total your car, you can just hit rewind and go back to a point before you made the turn.  This is perfect for a guy like me.  The rewinds are limited, though, so you have to decide when it's worth using them.  And even if you don't come in first, you still gain experience for racing the track, so you're always progressing and unlocking new things, which makes for a great incentive to keep playing and cuts down on frustration.  I need to go log in some hours behind the wheel with this one, but I've loved what I've played so far.

Most Original Game - flower


How do you describe a game like Flower?  It's a very, very simple game.  You control...the wind?  A petal?  I don't know what it is, but you push any button to fly, and you steer by tilting the Sixaxis controller.  Don't worry, it actually works in this game.  You fly into flowers to make them bloom and it gives you more petals.  And that's pretty much it.  But the game feels like it's more than that.  It looks beautiful, and each stage is unique.  It's really a game you have to see in action to understand it.  So why don't you just go do that here?  In this case, a Quick Look is worth a thousand words.

Best Adventure Game - Tales of Monkey Island

 This has the been a great year in terms of adventure games.  And almost all the credit goes to the fine folks at Telltale Games.  They have been making quality games with some truly great humor for a while now.  And Tales of Monkey Island is no exception.  Each episode follows the now standard Telltale formula, where you have to solve an initial problem, then solve three different problems, then move on to three more, until you come across the final conflict of the episode.  And for Monkey Island, they end it on a cliffhanger that makes you want to leap into the next episode right away.  Considering they only released one episode a month, though, that was pretty hard to do.  But they're all out now, so you can now play the whole season at once if that's your thing.  What makes Tales of Monkey Island so great is the trademark humor.  It's kind of required to already be familiar with Guybrush Threepwood and his supporting cast to really understand what's going on, but they've recently released the original game so you should go play that if you've never had a Monkey Island experience.  The humor is very self aware and spot on, and the characters all stand out pretty well.  They also throw in some great twists to most of the returning characters that play out well over the course of the season, which keeps it from seeming like the same old story again.  I've really enjoyed getting back into another Monkey Island game this year, something I was worried I would never be able to say again.  Welcome back, Guybrush Threepwood, mighty pirate.

Best Game From Last Year That I'm STILL Playing - Rock Band 2

Do I really need to talk about this one?  It's Rock Band 2.  It's awesome.  And I'm still playing it.  Oh, and it has "Don't Stop Believing" available for purchase in it.  That should be enough to explain this one.

 








Best Games That I Really Want to Get Back to Playing at Some Point

This is my list of shame for the year.  Borderlands, Halo 3 ODST, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Dragon Age, and others stand among the games I've started and need to finish.  Add that to the games that are out or coming out soon that I want to play, like DJ Hero, God of War III, and The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks.  And then there are the countless games from prior years that I've never finished.  Final Fantasy XII, Okami, Banjo & Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts, and Xenogears are amongst the pile.  Heck, I'm still meaning to leap back into Fallout 3 to play the DLC packs.  I'm terrible at finishing what I've started most of the time, and the shiny new games are often irresistible to me. 

Take Borderlands, one of the major releases this winter.  It's an awesome game that combines the mechanics of an FPS with the addiction of loot gathering.  Tons of people have played through it.  Me?  I just beat Sledge.  How about Dragon Age?  I'm doing even worse with that one, when I should be glued to the screen.  I love the characters and the story progression, but I'm scared to death of the choices and the knowledge that I will die often and die brutally.

Then there are the games I've just started recently.  Silent Hill Shattered Memories probably deserves its own recognition section, as it has some really simple mechanics yet leaves a deep impression on you while you're playing it.  Also, New Super Mario Bros. Wii is a classic style Mario game, which automatically makes it fantastic.  Needless to say, there are a lot of great games out there that I will never have time to finish.  Wait, should this really be under the "Best Of" section?

Best and Worst of 2009: Worst of 2009

As we come closer to the end of another year, people will start making their lists of the best and worst things of this year of our Lord, two thousand and nine.  And why should I be any different?  So over the next week, I'll be taking a look at some of my favorite games of the year, as well as some of it's lowest points.  This is very much a personal list, as I don't think I'm qualified to make a definitive statement like "This is the best game that was made this year."  They are just my personal highs and lows.  I'll be getting the negative points out of the way first, and then tomorrow I'll discuss some honorable mentions.  Then, each day I'll highlight five games that stand out as my personal favorites of the year.  They aren't really meant to be ranked in order, as I had a ton of fun with each one.  So without further ado, let's get on with the best and worst of 2009!

Worst of 2009

Biggest Disappointment - Killzone 2

I wanted to like Killzone 2.  I really did.  It came out around a time when I had a serious shooter itch, and Killzone 2 seemed like it was shaping up to scratch that itch.  But a generic and unengaging story mixed with controls that I never really felt comfortable with came together to shatter that illusion.  Killzone 2 isn't a bad game, I guess, but it certainly didn't satisfy.  It's a competent shooter, but I goes way too far off into cliche territory without finding a way to distinguish itself.  It has multiplayer which is theoretically very good, but I never tried it.  I had a crappy internet connection at the time, and once that got fixed I was pretty much over Killzone 2.  This isn't the game's fault, but it might also say something about how I wasn't entertained by Killzone enough to want to go play more of it.

Most Controller Smashingly Frustrating Game - Street Fighter 4

Street Fighter 4 is a very good game that I am very, very bad at playing.  I just have to suck it up and admit that I totally suck at fighting games.  I used to be able to hold my own, but I have almost no skill at these things anymore.  This game has a cool art style and brings back all the stuff you loved about Street Fighter 2, but it's not for me.  I can barely beat the computer, for crying out loud.  God forbid I should ever try to get online with this thing.  Also, I have to say, using the XBox 360 controller is one of the worst experiences ever when playing this game.  There are better controllers you can buy, but if you are going to make a game that basically requires you to own a separate controller, you had better pack that thing in the box.  Can you imagine if Guitar Hero hadn't done that the first time around?!  I'm pretty sure this game has shaved a few years off of my life from the sheer amount of rage it generated.

Worst Use of Nathan Fillion - Halo 3 ODST

Now don't get me wrong.  I love Nathan Fillion.  And ODST is a pretty good game as well.  But the combination of the two just don't work that well.  When I heard that he was featured very heavily in this game, I was stoked.  Unfortunately, it just isn't anything special.  The character is OK, but he's not that memorable either, which is a bummer.  He also looks kind of weird.  They used his likeness in the game, and it comes off as cartoonish in that uncomfortable uncanny valley way.  Also, it has to be said, that his heavy breathing when wounded is one of the most annoying things I've heard all year.  And there have been a lot of annoying things in games this year.

Most Unfair Level Design - Splosion Man

I love Splosion Man.  It's a fun and quirky game that demands precision platforming, which is exactly the kind of game I love.  However, when you get to the later levels, you get the feeling that the game was designed by a bunch of sadists.  There were points where I could have sworn I should have been succeeding and didn't know what I was doing wrong.  If your timing is off by a split second, you're dead.  I suppose it should feel rewarding when you finally push past it, but in truth it just made me want to go splode something down at Twisted Pixel. 

Dumbest Story - Killzone 2

OK, I couldn't resist going back to the Killzone well one more time.  But seriously, go back and read my summary of the plot from this summer.  While I'm pretty sarcastic, it actually follows the actual plot of the game.  It is laden with profanity in an obvious attempt to be "hardcore".  It has the "hoo-ah" attitude, but that just doesn't work when you're dealing with a sci-fi war.  Am I supposed to feel patriotic about fighting for this fictional army?  It tries to get moving and "personal" with a character death, but that character had very little to distinguish him from the other grunts in the meat grinder.  This was just an uninteresting story with a bunch of unlikeable protagonists in a very bland world.  Meh.

Game I'm Most Apathetic About - Dante's Inferno


While this is technically a 2010 game, they've spent a large portion of this year promoting the game.  First off, they take the classic story from the Divine Comedy and try to make it into a God of War clone.  Now, I've never read the Inferno, but I know that the game they've made has almost NOTHING to do with that story.  They really just wanted to make a game where you hack and slash your way into hell, and decided to use a familiar name to slap onto it.  Added to that is their completely offensive marketing campaign.  Now I'm not offended by the messages of the campaign, even though they definitely want me to be.  I'm offended by the intentions of the campaign.  You see, it's pretty obvious they are TRYING to be offensive and controversial.  They've staged fake protests and made bizzare fake religious products like "We Pray".  Add to that the press release about you having to fight aborted babies in hell, and it's pretty clear they are trying to stir up a furor amongst "them religious types".  And that just smacks of being juvenile, in my opinion.  It seems to me that they're trying to stir up an image of being "cool and dangerous", and get buzz by having Fox News shake their fists at them.  But this all just makes me not want to play their game.  In fact, I'm dangerously close to changing from being apathetic to actively disliking the game.  I'll just wait until God of War 3 come out.  Which isn't that far off.

Christmas With Delta Squad

There's no doubt that the members of Delta Squad (from Epic's smash hit series Gears of War) are highly effective killing machines, born and bred for the battlefield.  But how would they fare in more mundane, everyday situations?  Let's explore this concept as we join Marcus, Dom, Baird, and Cole as they do some last minute Christmas Shopping:

The Gears are in one of the few remaining department stores on the planet.  As Marcus and Dom approach the register, they see that the line stretches far back from the registers and into the aisles, with at least fifty people in front of them.

MARCUS

Aw, come on!

DOM

What did you expect, Marcus?  Every other functioning department store went down into Locust country with Jacinto.

MARCUS

Yeah, well I'm not the kind of guy to wait patiently in a line.  I see a line like this, I want to buzz through it with the chainsaw on my lancer.

DOM

Well you can't do that.  These are the people we're fighting to protect, remember?  There's no reason to keep attacking the Locust horde if we're just going to kill everyone ourselves.

MARCUS

Hey, you're right!  We are fighting to protect them!  They should let us enter at the front of the line as a reward for our service!

DOM

Uh, Marcus, I don't think that's such a good-

Marcus walks up to an old lady near the front of the line.

MARCUS

Hey!  I'm one of the Gears who's poured out his blood for your life!  Let me cut in front of you!

Moments later, Marcus and Dom are standing near the back of the line.  Marcus is sporting a black eye, while Dom is trying to keep from busting out laughing.  Baird wanders over with some toys in hand. 

BAIRD

Alright!  Thanks for grabbing a spot in line.

MARCUS

Oh no, Baird!  You go to the back with the rest of the garbage!

BAIRD
Come on, man!  You'll just have to wait for me when you're done!  Wait...what happened to your eye?

MARCUS

Nothing.

DOM

BAH HAH HAH!

MARCUS

Not a word, Dom!

BAIRD
What?  What happened?

DOM

Marcus got punched out by an old lady!

Baird and Dom buckle over from laughter.

MARCUS

Hey, shut up!  That old bag is tougher than she looks!  She could probably tear the legs off a Corpser with her bare hands!

BAIRD
Oh God!  Mr. Macho Man Marcus Phoenix ain't such hot stuff after all!

Marcus grabs Baird and kicks him in the groin.  Baird buckles over and falls to the ground.

BAIRD
Oh God, man!  Why?!

MARCUS
Who's laughing now, jackass?

DOM
Dude.  Not cool.

MARCUS
Oh, he had it coming and you know it.

Cole runs over to the line.

COLE
Oh yeah, Cole Train in the house!

DOM
Hey Cole.

MARCUS
About time you got here.  I hope you aren't thinking of cutting in line with us too.

COLE
Nah, son.  Cole is gonna get himself some Zhu Zhus, baby!

DOM
Are you serious?  Cole, those things have been sold out for months!

COLE
I'm sure they've got some in the back.  You just gotta know how to sweet talk them employees.

A couple of kids go speeding by the line inside of shopping carts, cheering with excitement.  The Delta Squad members look at each other, and idea forming in their heads.

MARCUS
If they can ride 'em, so can we!

Delta Squad starts to race one another inside of shopping carts.

MARCUS
Merry Christmas, to one and all!

"The Mirror Cracked From Side to Side"

So they (meaning EA) keep saying that Mirror’s Edge is a game that deserves to come back. All I can think is, “Really? Cause that game was terrible.” Actually, let me back up a bit to explain myself. Mirror’s Edge is a game with some very interesting ideas that were saddled down with terrible, TERRIBLE execution. The core of the game is actually kind of fun. You engage in free-running activities from a first person perspective, which is both exhilarating and nauseating. Think of a carnival ride and you kind of get the picture. When you’re out in the open, running as fast as you can and leaping over and under obstacles, the game is actually OK. The graphics were kind of nice too. Everything else about the game was a mess, though. And I mean everything.


The story is garbage. It’s riddled with uninteresting and unlikeable characters. The plot tries to weave a story of conspiracy and betrayal, but it ends up just being annoying and unnecessary. Your contact who’s supposed to be guiding you and providing you with intel is just an aggravating bag of wind. There are places where you have no idea where they expect you to go, and instead of giving you a helpful hint he just gripes and yells at you to get moving. Gee, thanks buddy! Your helpful words of “Move your ass!” have really inspired me to solve this conundrum! When he (Spoiler Alert!) dies, it’s supposed to be a tragic moment, but I just pumped my fist and cheered knowing I wouldn’t have to listen to his stupid comments anymore.  That's never a good sign.

The gameplay is also garbage. “But wait!” I hear you say. OK, so I don’t actually hear it, but I’m just assuming you’re saying that. So go ahead and say it, so you won’t make a liar out of me. Then say, “You just said that you thought the gameplay was OK!” No, actually, I said the CORE gameplay is kind of fun. You see, they don’t stick to that. Instead, they throw you into narrow corridors with little guidance on how to get where you need to. And while that is frustrating, they also felt the need to cram in combat. Cause every first person game needs guns, right? There are times where you can isolate one guy, run up a wall and kick him, then keep moving. This is fine with me, as it seems to follow the general mood of the game. It’s when they expect you to clear a room of cops that I get angry.

First off, this is not a first person shooter. This is a first person “runner”, if anything. Your character runs across rooftops, so when the police are after her, the first instinct is to run. To encourage this, the developers made your character extremely vulnerable, as she is only able to take a few hits before going down. But then, there are moments where it is almost impossible to proceed without dealing with most, if not all, of the police. This is where it felt like the game was punishing me for doing what it had trained me to do. It’s also very hard to take all the guys out with your kung-fu-ish moves since the others have, you know, guns. To counter this, you can take the guns from these cops and use them against them. My problem is that this seems counter to the whole concept of you being the good guy. They give you some indication that this future is a totalitarian state and there are bad dudes in charge, but does that really mean it’s OK to kill a bunch of cops? These guys probably had families, and were just joining up with the force because they wanted to keep the peace!  They do nothing to establish that the whole police force is a bunch of bullies and crooks.  And yes, it’s a video game so they're not actually real, but I’m talking about the principle of the thing. It really kind of breaks the mood and feel of the game, and was one of the first things that soured me on the whole thing.

Mirror’s Edge is not a long game, yet I still couldn’t make myself finish it. I hit a point where I decided I just didn’t want to play it anymore. This was a game that I was hopefully optimistic about, and I ended up with a very negative feeling towards it. Maybe they can fix what was wrong in a sequel. Maybe this one will be fun all the way through. But even if they do, the story stuff will still be there. They can revisit Mirror’s Edge if they want, but it’ll take a lot to convince me to come along for the ride.