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The Eurogamer Expo came to Leeds this year, and as I lived only a few miles away, I managed to snag a couple of press passes for myself and a buddy and decided to pop along and see what Q3 2009 and the whole of 2010 had in store for us all. When myself and Pieman arrived we were greeted by my fellow Aviva-ites, Ellis, Chris and Rob, who saved us a spot in line. Very gentlemanly!
Once inside, Pieman and I were told that, as we were "press", we could have just walked in. Ah well, nevermind. Wristbands on, and we were off. First stop.... If you've played the New Super Mario Bros game on the DS, then you'll more than likely enjoy this one. Using the same style of graphics (a more polished version of the SNES game Super Mario World), we played a few of the games Challenge levels. 3 of us played through some familiar surroundings - the Mushroom Kingdom, underground caves, in the ocean - grabbing coins and stomping Goombas. If a player dies, they reappear in a bubble and must either be freed by another player, or must shake the Wiimote to spin-break the bubble.
Each level was only a brief affair, ending with a traditional flagpole to grab hold of (the one who gets the highest got the most points). We never got to try out the story mode, but it was clear to see this was Nintendo's attempt to make their very own LittleBigPlanet, and from what we played it certainly was a lot of fun, but there's only so many ways you can churn out the same Mario game before it gets stale. Fingers crossed the story mode is more in-depth than the challenge mode we played. Impressed rating: 85/100 I was a fan of the original, despite its many obvious flaws (and they were many and obvious), so when news of a sequel was announced, I hoped that the developers would try to iron out the first games issues and make the game Red Steel should have been. Watching a fella picking up the controls, I stood by and watched carefully, and was more than a touch surprised. Out has gone the dull greys of the first and in comes brightly coloured cel-shading, and almost immediately, the action started. After being dragged behind a motorbike and had abuse hurled at him by the rider, the guy managed to shoot the chain to free himself, and then shot the bike, turning it into a roaring fireball.
The resulting flames looked very nice indeed, and looking around at the surroundings its good to say the scenery and the characters themselves looked just as good, which given the Wiis limited capabilities was great. Unfortunately, the same gameplay problems that were present in the original still plague the sequel - turning is a pain and its easy to lose track of where you are, both of which are bad news in an FPS. Swordplay has vastly improved, and watching the guy taking down a huge steampunk-barbarian giant with a series of well aimed slices, combined with a few revolver shots, was highly entertaining. Hopefully they can sort out the issues with the controls before release. From a graphical perspective, its one of the best on Wii so far, but at the moment, doesn't play all that well. Impressed rating: 80/100 I got bored of the original very quickly as theres only so many minaret swandives you can do before it gets dull, and I figured this would be more of the same. So I stood there, camera in hand, and watched intently as the guy in the chair took Ezio on a tour of Italy. As I watched, I saw that it was indeed more of the same, but the new features made for a more exciting experience.
The dual wristblades were the first things I noticed, as he pinned two enemies to a wall by their throats. Peering over the edge of a building, a simple button press sent him leaping onto the back of the guard below, not to mention the knife into his spine. As he proceeded to run around the moonlit town, the water reflecting every single bit of light in the sky, the dust and debris kicked up when wallrunning, the people below living in their own little worlds, its clear there has been a lot of work gone into progressing this franchise and bringing the feel of rennaisance Italy that much closer to our living rooms - and our jugulars. Impressed rating: 90/100 I was a huge fan of the original PC game, and it still scares the bejesus out of me today. The new AvP game takes everything that made the first game great, and improves on pretty much everything. From a graphical standpoint, its simply stellar. The alien temples in the level I saw are adorned with statues (which I later discovered was a perfect campling spot for an actual Alien), and once again, playing as the Marine is likely to cause your heart to collapse on itself out of fright.
While I was observing the 4-player multiplayer booth, one Marine player was simply scouting for ammo when his radar picked up movement. Frantically scanning the area I nicknamed "the valley of deceptive stone alien statues that is the perfect hiding place for aliens", it was over in a flash as the Alien player scuttled towards him, running up the wall and leaping.... the Marine was fatally wounded and, almost adding insult to injury, the Alien raised its tail and speared him square between the eyes. Unfortunately there was only the one multiplayer arena available so there wasn't room for comparison with any other settings, but I think its safe to say that the rest of the game to be just as polished. Impressed rating: 90/100 Lets get one thing clear: this is a blatant, unashamed ripoff of God Of War and Ninja Gaiden. Any idiot can tell you that. And I just did. There's nothing original in this game at all, other than the storyline. But given that the God Of War series is one of the best around at the moment, and Ninja Gaiden is one of the most impressive and unforgiving slash-em-ups out today, is that really a bad thing?
The characters were all highly detailed, and the scenery for the most part is a horrifying canvas of tortured creatures in their twisted torment - well, this is Hell, after all. The enemies were scary as hell (a baby with a carving knife is scary enough, so imagine a swarm of them!), and the bosses obscenely huge. And while there were some quick-time events in the demo I played, they were forgiving and allowed you more than a split second to react to. That said, when an enemy hits you, expect to lose a massive chunk of life: this game hates you, and you will be punished.
But it was fun to play. The graphics are as polished and visceral as its opponents, and there is so much blood and gore that even hardcore Holby City fans will squirm at some of the executions in the game. But unless the story is stellar, I'd say that this will get ignored on the PS3 as people wait for God Of War III, but might get itself established on the 360. Well worth a dabble, but only time will tell. Impressed rating: 95/100 Words cannot describe the awesome. I'm not even going to try. The best looking, the best playing, the best sounding, the best game full stop of Eurogamer. Kratos is back, he's slightly irritated, and he's out for blood. Everyones.
There is simply nothing bad that I can say about this game, other than the demo I played ended just as Kratos launched himself at a 300-foot tall fire titan. Pure amazing. Impressed rating: 99/100 Having never played the original, but been told all about it by a hardcore fan, I could tell that a sequel would have a lot to live up to. But after seeing a guy beat a zombie to death with the business end of an electric guitar, I was sold. Not sure if it was because it was still in development or because I'd already seen so many great looking games before it, the other co-op characters and enemies seemed to be very bland on the screen I was watching. I guess it didn't help that the zombies were running around in daylight too, but I wasn't overly impressed with how it looked. But it was clear to see that the action was there, the scare factor was there, and the three guys screaming at the fourth to "Get in the f**king van and close the f**king door!" made it clear that this would make AND break friendships when it launches.
Fingers crossed that this wasn't the finished version, as it'll upset a lot of people looking as bland as it did. But for those wanting their fill of action and co-op scares, then the future looks very promising. Impressed rating: 80/100 I've already said enough about this MMOFPS, but from the massive queues for a seat, it was clear this was a big draw. And rightly so. No single player mode in sight, this is purely an online, multiplayer experience. All 8 booths were set up to be the SVER faction, and I later found out that the main servers for MAG had been activated the entire day to allow people at this event to play along with the people in the beta playing from home. A few people were put off by the game dropping them right in the action and getting slaughtered, but a few people who considered themselves "COD vets" took it for a spin and seemed to really enjoy it. It won't break any records for visuals, but in terms of balls-to-the-wall action and a real sense of teamwork, you'll be hard put to better this game. Impressed rating: 90/100 I love Burnout Paradise. With all my heart. But not even a Hawker Solo doing a triple barrel roll into the quarry could make me cack myself with a mixture of excitement and terror as much as Split/Second did. Another racing game where powersliding and smashing other cars fills a little super meter. But instead of boosting, you can detonate parts of the track and scenery, causing the entire racecourse to change. Blow up a bridge, you drop into an underground shopping mall. Detonate the mall, and you have to escape before you're crushed. Blow up a telecoms tower, block half the road off. And press the detonate button when approaching the airport, and you will have to avoid a flaming, crash-landing Boeing 747 as it drops out of the sky and hurtles towards you, sending dust and debris flying everywhere, and hopefully taking out your rivals. Forget your Need For Speed. Tell your Gran Turismo to go knackers. Advise Forza to go fornicate itself. Split/Second is going to destroy the opposition, literally. Impressed rating: 95/100 Now this was a nice surprise, and nothing I'd heard about before the Expo. From Relentless Software comes a game from the Professor Layton school of puzzle-em-ups, in episodes no less. We were given a 3D barcode badge outside the building, and scanning it with a specific app on a Smartphone would take us to a secret website address with surprises there, waiting for us. Unfortunately, I didn't have a Smartphone, so we couldn't experience this. But what I did see was plenty of puzzles to get the old gray matter ticking, some great visuals, some wicked humour, and the young woman at the booth told us that it would be on the PSN Store, priced at £9.99 for two episodes, and would span a total of six episodes. We also got us some t-shirts, but alas, only medium size. Needless to say, as a fan of the Professor Layton games, this is one to keep an eye on. A real surprise, considering I'd not heard of this before. Impressed rating: 85/100 |
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