The Call of Duty games by Infinity Ward (specifically, COD2, COD4 and Modern Warfare 2) are highly regarded games in the industry. Not only do they receive critical acclaim but they also get the sales figures to match. All in all, one of the highlights of the FPS genre.
Which probably makes it surprising for you to hear that I don't own any of the COD games.
The main reason for this is that Activision always prices the COD games with a heavy premium. The second reason is that I have a friend who likes the COD series and I was able to borrow both COD2 and recently, COD4 from him. And it was well worth the wait!
Stuff I liked
Set pieces
COD4 is full of fantastic set pieces. Right at the start of the game, you are involved in a night raid on a tanker in the middle of the ocean. Near the end, the tanker gets taken out by a Mig with you still inside and the game becomes a mad dash as you try and get out of the bowels of the sinking ship! And this is before the opening credits have rolled!
Sharp controls
As you probably know by now, bad controls piss me off. Luckily the COD games have always had great controls which are responsive and well adjusted to the xbox controller. Its hard to put into words but part of the reason that the COD games are so much fun is that the controls are so well done that you just don't need to think about them at all. I've played lots of FPS games on the xbox and very few feel as good as COD4.
Achievements
This may sound silly but I love the fact that all of the achievements for COD4 can be attained via the singleplayer. Considering how late I am to the game, there is not much point in me jumping online. The only people left playing online at this stage would be the die-hard experts and would likely be able to wipe the floor with me even if all they were armed with was a pistol.
Having said that, the achievements aren't easy to get. Completing the game on Veteran difficulty was hard. And frankly, getting the mile high club achievement looks like it may be out of my league (won't stop me trying though!).
Stuff I didn't like
Length
Its probably unfair to rag on this game for length as it seems like most FPS games these days last in the 6-10 hour range. Having said that, after finishing COD4, I really wanted to keep on playing. Also, I can't think of anything else to complain about and I couldn't just leave this section blank, could I?
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Alan Wake
Alan Wake is an X360 exclusive which was developed by Remedy Entertainment - the same bunch of guys behind the excellent Max Payne. The game itself bears a lot of similarities to Max Payne (eg third person view, the main character is narrating etc). However, there are a couple of key differences - the main one being the style of game itself. Remedy are pitching Alan Wake as a psychological thriller. Everyone else is calling it a damn fine survival horror game!
The short version of the story was probably best explained by the Penny Arcade guys. Click here if you don't mind minor spoilers.
In Alan Wake, you play the role of Alan Wake (surprise!). Alan is a famous writer of horror stories (a la Stephen King) who is suffering from writer's block. To help overcome this, Alan and his wife travel to a remote village in the middle of nowhere so that he can recharge his batteries. This being a survival horror game, it isn't long before the fit hits the shan and you find yourself on the run from both the police and the creatures of the night which are out to take over the world!
Stuff I liked
Controls - Sorry for beating this tired old horse again but I really can't stress how important a good control scheme is. The fact is that Alan Wake uses the thumbsticks in an industry standard control scheme (left stick controls movement while right stick controls camera) and this allows me to jump straight into the gameplay without worrying about the controls.
Atmosphere - Remedy did a fantastic job with the graphics. Just like with FEAR, I only played this game at night with the lights down low and you really feel the tension when you are wandering around the woods at night with only your flashlight to show the way. This may sound cliche but I really struggled to play this game for a long period of time.
In many ways, the atmosphere is much better than in FEAR. In FEAR, there was a limit to the actual fear factor as you were generally armed to the teeth with guns and grenades. However, in Alan Wake, you generally find yourself being careful with your ammo in case you run out before the next ammo cache. This fundamental difference really changes the way the tension mounts during the game.
Episodic - Remedy also did a really good job in breaking up the game into episodes. Each episode starts off in relative safety before building up to a climactic finish for that episode. By the time you finish one episode, your nerves are shot through and its a great place to stop and take a break.
They also do a good job of selling the episodes as each episode starts with a summary of what has happened so far and effectively ends with credits (no actual credits scroll but you have a different song to end each episode).
Stuff I didn't like
Episodic - Unfortunately, Remedy didn't think through the episodic format very well. At the end of each episode, it automatically goes into the next episode without asking if you want to save and stop. Which defeats the purpose of having an episodic format to start with. If the intention was for the player to simply dive into the next episode, why bother breaking up the game with music and episode summaries?
Enemies - This is a bit of an obvious nitpick but a little bit more variety in the enemy types would have helped this game. Although I never got tired of the combat, it does reduce the fear level a bit when you know exactly what to do to defeat the enemy. In fact, it got to the stage where fighting enemies became routine and wasn't scary at all.
One last comment. This game has received a lot of criticism for the amount of real life ad placements within the game. Speaking for myself, I never considered it an issue as the ads were appropriate and didn't pull me out of the game. For example, you need batteries to power your torch so you are constantly on the lookout for more batteries. Does it really pull you out of the game if those batteries are branded?
The short version of the story was probably best explained by the Penny Arcade guys. Click here if you don't mind minor spoilers.
In Alan Wake, you play the role of Alan Wake (surprise!). Alan is a famous writer of horror stories (a la Stephen King) who is suffering from writer's block. To help overcome this, Alan and his wife travel to a remote village in the middle of nowhere so that he can recharge his batteries. This being a survival horror game, it isn't long before the fit hits the shan and you find yourself on the run from both the police and the creatures of the night which are out to take over the world!
Stuff I liked
Controls - Sorry for beating this tired old horse again but I really can't stress how important a good control scheme is. The fact is that Alan Wake uses the thumbsticks in an industry standard control scheme (left stick controls movement while right stick controls camera) and this allows me to jump straight into the gameplay without worrying about the controls.
Atmosphere - Remedy did a fantastic job with the graphics. Just like with FEAR, I only played this game at night with the lights down low and you really feel the tension when you are wandering around the woods at night with only your flashlight to show the way. This may sound cliche but I really struggled to play this game for a long period of time.
In many ways, the atmosphere is much better than in FEAR. In FEAR, there was a limit to the actual fear factor as you were generally armed to the teeth with guns and grenades. However, in Alan Wake, you generally find yourself being careful with your ammo in case you run out before the next ammo cache. This fundamental difference really changes the way the tension mounts during the game.
Episodic - Remedy also did a really good job in breaking up the game into episodes. Each episode starts off in relative safety before building up to a climactic finish for that episode. By the time you finish one episode, your nerves are shot through and its a great place to stop and take a break.
They also do a good job of selling the episodes as each episode starts with a summary of what has happened so far and effectively ends with credits (no actual credits scroll but you have a different song to end each episode).
Stuff I didn't like
Episodic - Unfortunately, Remedy didn't think through the episodic format very well. At the end of each episode, it automatically goes into the next episode without asking if you want to save and stop. Which defeats the purpose of having an episodic format to start with. If the intention was for the player to simply dive into the next episode, why bother breaking up the game with music and episode summaries?
Enemies - This is a bit of an obvious nitpick but a little bit more variety in the enemy types would have helped this game. Although I never got tired of the combat, it does reduce the fear level a bit when you know exactly what to do to defeat the enemy. In fact, it got to the stage where fighting enemies became routine and wasn't scary at all.
One last comment. This game has received a lot of criticism for the amount of real life ad placements within the game. Speaking for myself, I never considered it an issue as the ads were appropriate and didn't pull me out of the game. For example, you need batteries to power your torch so you are constantly on the lookout for more batteries. Does it really pull you out of the game if those batteries are branded?
Saturday, July 3, 2010
Football Manager 2010 - 2010/11
I'm burning through FM2010 at the moment and season 2010/11 has been a real rollercoaster.
Pre-season
As I mentioned in last seasons year end report, a world class striker was the key thing that I needed to buy over the pre-season. Luckily for me, the new board gave me a transfer kitty of GBP62 million which I promptly raided for GBP52 million on Sergio Aguero.
Check out those stats! If Torres isn't careful, Aguero is going to steal his thunder
I also made two stupid mistakes over the pre-season. I completely forgot that Milan Jovanovic was joining on a free transfer so I signed Victor Obinna (a 23 year old backup with fast pace) on a free transfer as extra cover for my strikers. I went from not having enough strikers in 2009/10 to having too many strikers in 2010/11! Ah well, I guess its lucky I signed Obinna as a backup so he didn't complain too much when I ditched him in the reserves.
Milan Jovanovic - nice piece of business by Benitez to capture him as he has some good stats
The other mistake I made was in forgetting that I would need 8 players who trained in England starting from 2010/11 (due to new rules). Unfortunately, the Liverpool squad is mainly comprised of foreign players and it meant that, in order to accommodate Aguero, Jovanovic and Obinna, I had to drop both Kyrgiakos and Degen. Luckily, I had managed to sign some young up and coming talent as cover.
Despite the mistakes, it was a good preseason which saw the side strengthened in a couple of key areas. This good feeling lasted until the board set their expectations for the year ahead. As usual, they didn't care about the League Cup but they did expect me to challenge for the premiership as well as reach the final of the FA Cup and the Champions Cup.
Really? I was expected to reach the final of the Champions Cup?
No f'ing pressure then...
FA and League Cup
The League Cup has been a funny experience this year. I planned to mainly play my second stringers in the League Cup this year but came up against Everton early on. What could I do? There was no way I was going to risk the wrath of the fans by being knocked out of a cup competition by Everton so I ended up playing my first team players for that game.
After Everton, we came up against Chelsea. The interesting thing was that 3 days after the League Cup game with Chelsea, we would then face Chelsea again in the 5th round of the FA cup. I stuck with my youth policy and played my second stringers so that I could save my first team players for the FA cup match with Chelsea. Somehow, and I don't know how, we managed to win the League Cup game but lost the FA cup game (albeit on penalties after ET).
We then had a couple of relatively easy games in the League Cup which gave us another cup final to look forward to. I played my first team again and we managed to retain the League Cup. Small recompense for not getting to the final of the FA cup but there you go.
Premiership
Liverpool started the season extremely well and took an early lead in the Premiership. Unfortunately, my team continued to struggle against "lesser" teams and it wasn't long before we started to drop points. Luckily for us, other teams dropped points as well and by the end of the season, the top of the table was pretty congested with Liverpool, Man City, Chelsea and Tottenham all within 3 points of each other.
Game 37 would see Liverpool take on Man City. At this point, Liverpool were top of the table and ahead of Man City by only 1 point. What a chance for Liverpool to seal off the Premiership!
Alas, we bottled it. We lost 1-0 and the Liverpool dressing room became very unwelcoming as the manager told his players exactly what he thought of them. All appeared lost as the only hope left was for Liverpool to win their last game against Middlesbrough while hoping that Stoke, who were close to relegation, somehow managed to beat Man City.
Game day 38 started with football fans the world over wondering how the season would end. Despite Liverpool starting brightly against Middlesbrough, they were unable to break down the Middlesbrough defence. Meanwhile, Man City had a player sent off and miraculously, Stoke were leading by 2-0!
As expected, the Liverpool dressing room at half time was witness to another expletive filled tirade as the manager tried to get his players to react and take advantage of Man City's misfortune. The second half started much as the first half ended - with Liverpool laying siege to Middlesbrough but unable to find a way through.
Meanwhile, Stoke shut up shop and, with an extra player on the pitch, managed to see out the win and save themselves from relegation. Could the bunch of bottlers at Liverpool take advantage of Man City's gift?
Well, could they?
The final league table - what a way to finish the season
Also - lets all laugh at Man Utd
Champions Cup
This is the big one. The most prestigious cup competition in the world (for clubs) with the biggest and best teams around. And I was expected to reach the final.
We managed to get through the group stage without any problems. We were also really lucky in the knockout stages as well as we managed to avoid the best teams until the semi-final where we came up against Bayern Munich. Despite that, we didn't exactly coast through as we generally only managed a 1-1 draw away from home before getting the home win which sent us through to the next round. Bayern Munich would be a much tougher nut to crack though.
And sure enough, Bayern Munich immediately showed their class by completely outplaying us in the first leg and beating us 3-2 at their home ground. Although we managed to get 2 away goals (2 lucky away goals completely against the run of play), I was furious at how badly we played. Still, it put us in a good position for the home leg (provided we could up our game that is). In the end, the home leg proved anti-climactic as Bayern had a defender sent off in the first half which ultimately gave us an easy victory.
And with that little piece of luck, we managed to get to the final of the Champions Cup and meet our Board expectations. Of course, the story wasn't quite over yet. We still had to play the Champions Cup final against .... Chelsea.
Chelsea? Again?
Blimey. Not only do we have an all English final but this will make it 5 games this season where we have faced off against Chelsea. The last time we played Chelsea was in the FA cup which went to ET and penalties before we got knocked out. And would you believe it - the Champions Cup final also went to ET and penalties. Not exactly a good omen for Liverpool.
Good thing I don't believe in Omens!
In the end, Reina did a Reina special and won us the Champions Cup! What a way to end his Liverpool career!
I guess now is a good time to mention that halfway through the season, Reina decided he wanted a new challenge and wanted to leave. Bastard.
The Squad
Here is a snapshot of my squad as at year end.
As with last year, Stevie G was my best player in terms of his average rating. However, Aguero was my best attacking player as he managed to score 22 goals as well as get 19 assists. What a purchase! Well worth the GBP52 million.
I also played Torres a lot more sparingly this year which meant that he spent less time injured. Overall, he ended up playing more as a result and ended up with a much more respectable 21 goals. I also noticed a theme in that Torres tends to only play well when he is the lone striker. If he has a strike partner, he tends to do poorly.
Key themes
Expectations - Despite what I felt were unrealistic expectations from the Board, we managed to do extremely well and win both the Premiership and the Champions Cup. By any definition, this has been a good year. Given that, can anyone explain why the pissant fans aren't happier?
Lesser teams - My team continues to struggle and drop points against lesser teams. I really need to find a way to deal with this as it almost cost us the Premiership this year. I have no idea what I can do though.
Torres - Torres actually struggled with injuries at the start of the year in a similar fashion to last year (ie couldn't last 3 games without an injury). This was particularly worrying as Aguero was still settling in at that time. Ultimately, once Aguero settled, the whole team benefited as I was able to rotate players a lot more which probably ultimately resulted in less injuries overall.
HG squad - Another problem facing my squad is the lack of home grown players (ie players who trained in England). I'm going to have to be really careful about who I sign in the pre-season until the hot prospects which I've been signing left, right and centre graduate from the academy and into the first team.
Transfer targets - Unfortunately, my superstar GK wants to leave. Signing a replacement for him has to be a top priority over the pre-season. Assuming I get enough money, I also need to buy a right winger who can hug the touchline on the right side of the pitch. On the left, I have Babel and Riera which is a good mix of one player who cuts inside and one who hugs the touchline. Unfortunately, on the right side of the pitch, I don't have anyone who can swing a decent cross and I will need to rectify this to give me some more options in attack.
Pre-season
As I mentioned in last seasons year end report, a world class striker was the key thing that I needed to buy over the pre-season. Luckily for me, the new board gave me a transfer kitty of GBP62 million which I promptly raided for GBP52 million on Sergio Aguero.
Check out those stats! If Torres isn't careful, Aguero is going to steal his thunder
I also made two stupid mistakes over the pre-season. I completely forgot that Milan Jovanovic was joining on a free transfer so I signed Victor Obinna (a 23 year old backup with fast pace) on a free transfer as extra cover for my strikers. I went from not having enough strikers in 2009/10 to having too many strikers in 2010/11! Ah well, I guess its lucky I signed Obinna as a backup so he didn't complain too much when I ditched him in the reserves.
Milan Jovanovic - nice piece of business by Benitez to capture him as he has some good stats
The other mistake I made was in forgetting that I would need 8 players who trained in England starting from 2010/11 (due to new rules). Unfortunately, the Liverpool squad is mainly comprised of foreign players and it meant that, in order to accommodate Aguero, Jovanovic and Obinna, I had to drop both Kyrgiakos and Degen. Luckily, I had managed to sign some young up and coming talent as cover.
Despite the mistakes, it was a good preseason which saw the side strengthened in a couple of key areas. This good feeling lasted until the board set their expectations for the year ahead. As usual, they didn't care about the League Cup but they did expect me to challenge for the premiership as well as reach the final of the FA Cup and the Champions Cup.
Really? I was expected to reach the final of the Champions Cup?
No f'ing pressure then...
FA and League Cup
The League Cup has been a funny experience this year. I planned to mainly play my second stringers in the League Cup this year but came up against Everton early on. What could I do? There was no way I was going to risk the wrath of the fans by being knocked out of a cup competition by Everton so I ended up playing my first team players for that game.
After Everton, we came up against Chelsea. The interesting thing was that 3 days after the League Cup game with Chelsea, we would then face Chelsea again in the 5th round of the FA cup. I stuck with my youth policy and played my second stringers so that I could save my first team players for the FA cup match with Chelsea. Somehow, and I don't know how, we managed to win the League Cup game but lost the FA cup game (albeit on penalties after ET).
We then had a couple of relatively easy games in the League Cup which gave us another cup final to look forward to. I played my first team again and we managed to retain the League Cup. Small recompense for not getting to the final of the FA cup but there you go.
Premiership
Liverpool started the season extremely well and took an early lead in the Premiership. Unfortunately, my team continued to struggle against "lesser" teams and it wasn't long before we started to drop points. Luckily for us, other teams dropped points as well and by the end of the season, the top of the table was pretty congested with Liverpool, Man City, Chelsea and Tottenham all within 3 points of each other.
Game 37 would see Liverpool take on Man City. At this point, Liverpool were top of the table and ahead of Man City by only 1 point. What a chance for Liverpool to seal off the Premiership!
Alas, we bottled it. We lost 1-0 and the Liverpool dressing room became very unwelcoming as the manager told his players exactly what he thought of them. All appeared lost as the only hope left was for Liverpool to win their last game against Middlesbrough while hoping that Stoke, who were close to relegation, somehow managed to beat Man City.
Game day 38 started with football fans the world over wondering how the season would end. Despite Liverpool starting brightly against Middlesbrough, they were unable to break down the Middlesbrough defence. Meanwhile, Man City had a player sent off and miraculously, Stoke were leading by 2-0!
As expected, the Liverpool dressing room at half time was witness to another expletive filled tirade as the manager tried to get his players to react and take advantage of Man City's misfortune. The second half started much as the first half ended - with Liverpool laying siege to Middlesbrough but unable to find a way through.
Meanwhile, Stoke shut up shop and, with an extra player on the pitch, managed to see out the win and save themselves from relegation. Could the bunch of bottlers at Liverpool take advantage of Man City's gift?
Well, could they?
The final league table - what a way to finish the season
Also - lets all laugh at Man Utd
Champions Cup
This is the big one. The most prestigious cup competition in the world (for clubs) with the biggest and best teams around. And I was expected to reach the final.
We managed to get through the group stage without any problems. We were also really lucky in the knockout stages as well as we managed to avoid the best teams until the semi-final where we came up against Bayern Munich. Despite that, we didn't exactly coast through as we generally only managed a 1-1 draw away from home before getting the home win which sent us through to the next round. Bayern Munich would be a much tougher nut to crack though.
And sure enough, Bayern Munich immediately showed their class by completely outplaying us in the first leg and beating us 3-2 at their home ground. Although we managed to get 2 away goals (2 lucky away goals completely against the run of play), I was furious at how badly we played. Still, it put us in a good position for the home leg (provided we could up our game that is). In the end, the home leg proved anti-climactic as Bayern had a defender sent off in the first half which ultimately gave us an easy victory.
And with that little piece of luck, we managed to get to the final of the Champions Cup and meet our Board expectations. Of course, the story wasn't quite over yet. We still had to play the Champions Cup final against .... Chelsea.
Chelsea? Again?
Blimey. Not only do we have an all English final but this will make it 5 games this season where we have faced off against Chelsea. The last time we played Chelsea was in the FA cup which went to ET and penalties before we got knocked out. And would you believe it - the Champions Cup final also went to ET and penalties. Not exactly a good omen for Liverpool.
Good thing I don't believe in Omens!
In the end, Reina did a Reina special and won us the Champions Cup! What a way to end his Liverpool career!
I guess now is a good time to mention that halfway through the season, Reina decided he wanted a new challenge and wanted to leave. Bastard.
The Squad
Here is a snapshot of my squad as at year end.
As with last year, Stevie G was my best player in terms of his average rating. However, Aguero was my best attacking player as he managed to score 22 goals as well as get 19 assists. What a purchase! Well worth the GBP52 million.
I also played Torres a lot more sparingly this year which meant that he spent less time injured. Overall, he ended up playing more as a result and ended up with a much more respectable 21 goals. I also noticed a theme in that Torres tends to only play well when he is the lone striker. If he has a strike partner, he tends to do poorly.
Key themes
Expectations - Despite what I felt were unrealistic expectations from the Board, we managed to do extremely well and win both the Premiership and the Champions Cup. By any definition, this has been a good year. Given that, can anyone explain why the pissant fans aren't happier?
Lesser teams - My team continues to struggle and drop points against lesser teams. I really need to find a way to deal with this as it almost cost us the Premiership this year. I have no idea what I can do though.
Torres - Torres actually struggled with injuries at the start of the year in a similar fashion to last year (ie couldn't last 3 games without an injury). This was particularly worrying as Aguero was still settling in at that time. Ultimately, once Aguero settled, the whole team benefited as I was able to rotate players a lot more which probably ultimately resulted in less injuries overall.
HG squad - Another problem facing my squad is the lack of home grown players (ie players who trained in England). I'm going to have to be really careful about who I sign in the pre-season until the hot prospects which I've been signing left, right and centre graduate from the academy and into the first team.
Transfer targets - Unfortunately, my superstar GK wants to leave. Signing a replacement for him has to be a top priority over the pre-season. Assuming I get enough money, I also need to buy a right winger who can hug the touchline on the right side of the pitch. On the left, I have Babel and Riera which is a good mix of one player who cuts inside and one who hugs the touchline. Unfortunately, on the right side of the pitch, I don't have anyone who can swing a decent cross and I will need to rectify this to give me some more options in attack.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
The importance of a good control scheme
One of the games I've been playing lately is Alan Wake, a survival horror game from Remedy Entertainment which is the same studio behind the classic third person shooter Max Payne. And in many ways, this shows in the game as it contains a lot of similar elements to Max Payne (such as the broody protagonist who likes the sound of his own voice a bit too much). Of course, the key difference is that Alan Wake is a survival horror game (although the developers are billing it as a psychological thriller).
If you have been reading my blog for a while, you will know that I do enjoy playing scary games. However, there is a big difference in style between a game like F.E.A.R., which is a shoot em up where you carry a boatload of heavy armament, and survival horror games like Alan Wake where you spend half your time worrying if you are going to have enough ammo for your pistol.
Believe it or not, Alan Wake is actually the first survival horror game that I have ever played. I was interested in Dead Space but it came out around the time when I was boycotting EA which is why I skipped it. I was also interested in the Resident Evil games but never got into them because of the horrible control scheme.
And this is really the first thing worth mentioning about Alan Wake. The game controls like every other TPS on the market and feels great because of it. You can strafe left or right, you can sprint (but only over short distances), you can walk in one direction while looking in a different direction (also known as turning your head). You never feel like you are fighting the clumsy control scheme instead of the monsters which inhabit the darkness. Ultimately, the control scheme makes the whole game better simply because it allows me to focus on the story instead of thinking about how I'm going to control my avatar.
And having played Alan Wake, it just makes it even more incomprehensible why the Resident Evil series continues to use an old and outdated control scheme.
If you have been reading my blog for a while, you will know that I do enjoy playing scary games. However, there is a big difference in style between a game like F.E.A.R., which is a shoot em up where you carry a boatload of heavy armament, and survival horror games like Alan Wake where you spend half your time worrying if you are going to have enough ammo for your pistol.
Believe it or not, Alan Wake is actually the first survival horror game that I have ever played. I was interested in Dead Space but it came out around the time when I was boycotting EA which is why I skipped it. I was also interested in the Resident Evil games but never got into them because of the horrible control scheme.
And this is really the first thing worth mentioning about Alan Wake. The game controls like every other TPS on the market and feels great because of it. You can strafe left or right, you can sprint (but only over short distances), you can walk in one direction while looking in a different direction (also known as turning your head). You never feel like you are fighting the clumsy control scheme instead of the monsters which inhabit the darkness. Ultimately, the control scheme makes the whole game better simply because it allows me to focus on the story instead of thinking about how I'm going to control my avatar.
And having played Alan Wake, it just makes it even more incomprehensible why the Resident Evil series continues to use an old and outdated control scheme.
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