Battlefield 3's Campaign is Shit

BF3's single player campaign is a load of old guff. The perfect example of style over substance. It looks pretty but it plays like a pig.

After a seen-it-a-billion-times-before opening level set on a train, you relive - via flashbacks - past events in which you shoot a load of faceless bad guys while stuff explodes in the background. Uninspired nonsense.

A particularly tedious level has you sitting in the back seat of a fighter jet while the pilot shouts incomprehensible army-speak at you for 12 hours before anything remotely interesting happens. When the action finally kicks off - shooting down enemy fighters - all you're asked to do is move your cursor over a target, wait for it to go beep, and push a button. I've had more interesting shits to be honest.

This sense of detachment, of not really contributing to the action in any significant way, continues throughout the campaign. I felt like a spectator rather than a participant during the action. I guess it's how a front line war correspondent must feel, in amongst the whizzing bullets and shrapnel but ultimately nothing more than an observer.

When fighting on open ground it's hard to suss exactly where enemy fire is coming from. After you finally pinpoint an insurgent, your squad mates have the annoying habit of stealing the kill.

I wonder, is the player's sense of detachment an inevitable part of modern warfare's impersonal methods of murder, or is it simply because BF3 is a bad game? I'm opting for the latter.

My first clue came when I opened the box. BF3 is the first video game I've seen in which the campaign has been relegated to the second disc. This should tell you everything you need to know about where Dice's priorities lie: the mulitplayer.

And boy does it show.

Why You Have To Play Batman Arkham City

Batman Arkham City is a next-gen title on a current-gen console. It’s a genuine miracle that my beat-up old Xbox managed to run this game without succumbing to a mechanical aneurism. Then again, miracles are all part of the caped crusader’s repertoire of skills.

Arkham City is brilliant because it makes you *feel* like Batman. Gliding effortlessly from a vantage point on high into a gang of Joker’s henchmen below, before reducing them to a heap of broken bones, encapsulates all of the Dark Knight’s strongest attributes: grace, beauty and brute power. And there’s nothing more iconic than a fully stretched bat-cape silhouetted against the pale glow of the moon.

The open, free-roaming city is both spectacular and intimidating. Perched on a gargoyle overlooking the sprawling city of Arkham, it soon becomes clear just how tightly packed the game is with incidental side quests: a ringing phone, a desperate cry for help, a flashing green question mark– all of these sights and sounds will lead you further in to the dark, gothic nightmare of a city turned sour.

Thankfully, the World’s Greatest Detective is up to the task. Batman is a painstakingly modelled swiss-army-knife of justice. His improved grapnel gun - unlocked after completing four Augmented Reality tutorials – allows for even faster movement around Arkham City. The ability to glide, dive bomb and grapple - all in one seamlessly fluid motion - is one of gaming’s greatest thrills.

What else? Well, there’s Catwoman. And I’m not ashamed to say that her stealth-crawl animation is the sexiest conglomeration of pixels I've ever seen. Okay, maybe I'm a *little* ashamed I just said that. Still, she can also kick ass, seducing enemies mid-fight, luring them in for a kiss and then knocking them unconscious when they let their guard down. And the feline femme fatale is just as mobile as old Brucey too, using her claws to climb the sides of buildings rather than grappling.

Its predecessor, Arkham Asylum, is one of this generation’s best games, but Arkham City takes it to a whole other level. Yahoo Games even went as far as to award the game 6 out of 5 saying, ‘Batman Arkham City improves on the original so much that it feels like gluttony.’ It’s not hard to see why this game has garnered such fevered praise. It’s the kind of game you’ll dream about in your sleep, long after you’ve turned off your console.

Rocksteady Studios – a British video game developer based in Kentish Town – deserves a place among the industry’s great and good. They have after all, given us one of the greatest gifts possible: the chance to be Batman.

Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine Review

The plot: kill all the Orcs. Stomp their pea-green noggins into the ground and rub the resultant brain-paste over your erect nipples. Trust me, there's simply no other way to approach this game. I was five minutes into Space Marine before I unlocked the ‘kill 100 enemies’ achievement. And that, dear reader, should give you a clear indication of the gratuitous levels of murder you're expected to perform.

Do you remember that epic battle from Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, where the besieged inhabitants of Helms Deep have to fend off a gazillion Uruk-Hai? Well, that's pretty much what you'll be doing for the entirety of the game, except in this instance you'll be cutting swathes through hordes of Orcs. Wave after wave of 'em, each one baying for your blood in delightful barrow-boy cockney: "Kill those spayce mah-reens!"

Every aspect of the game is geared towards the relentless decimation of the oncoming hordes. Unlike almost every other third person shooter, Space Marine offers no cover mechanic. There's literally nowhere to hide. And so you'll adopt very specific tactics to stop those encroaching Orc blades from meeting with your flesh.

I whittled away the stampeding green bastards with machine gun fire and grenades before finishing off the stragglers with a frenzied bout of hand-to-hand combat. Run ‘n gun, hack ‘n slash – the ease with which you’re able to combine these two play styles is without doubt Space Marine’s greatest strength. The left and right trigger take care of the shooty action while the face buttons control the close quarter combat. And it works beautifully.

The brutal executions are worth a mention too. Stun an enemy for the chance to perform a deliciously violent finisher, a personal favourite being the body-slam-head-stomp. The impressive draw distance allows for some sweet sniper action too. Felling a fleeing Orc with a bullet to his spine is devilish fun.

But not as fun as the jetpack.

Oh dear sweet jetpack, how I yearn for thee. At certain points in the game you’ll happen upon this exhilarating bit of kit. Strap it on and you're instantly transformed from a lumbering front-line soldier into an aeronautical angel of death. Launch high above the marauding hordes of Orcs before propelling yourself at devastating speed into their fleshy green ranks. Death from above, fuckers.

Space Marine’s campaign mode is like the lifespan of an average Orc: brutal, short and crammed with wanton ultra-violence. Ignore Edge magazine's snooty 5/10 review and give this a try. At the very least download the demo from Xbox Live and make an informed decision. You never know, this could be just the thing to tide you over until Gears of War 3 launches.

Shadows Of The Damned Review

Anyone who plays Shadows of the Damned will be wanked-off by Jesus in heaven. A divine handjob from the son of God. And who knows, if you're lucky you may even get to spunk in his stigmata.

I am, of course, kidding. I open with this sickening gambit because I want to set the right tone, and only a violation against The Almighty Himself will prepare you for the head-spinning cluster-fuck that is SoD.

Exaggeration? No. This game is FUBAR. Proof? Well, how about the 30ft stripper who's naked buttocks I had to traverse in order to progress in a level. Not weird enough for ya? Well then, how about the three-headed statue that vomits zombies? Trust me, this shit is stranger than Derren Brown on ecstasy.

And all those clueless cunts who cite linearity as a barrier to purchase are missing the point in the most spectacular fashion. Yes, the game is linear. And no, this doesn't detract from the demon-slaying fun. Who cares if the journey never deviates from its preordained path? It's FUN. And if you're a fun-hater you can fuck right off. Or in the words of one of the demented demons you encounter, 'FUUUUUUUCK YOOOOOOOOOU'.

Still here? Good, 'cos this review is about to get even more idiotic.

The spectre-thin plot – Hotspur’s girlfriend is dragged to hell by the Lord Of Demons, and he goes after her – sets up the action. From here on in it’s an unashamedly puerile medley of cock gags, B-Movie references and, of course, monster dismemberment. And what delightfully grotesque monsters they are. Think Pan’s Labyrinth and you’ll have a good idea of the kind of outlandish beasties that await you.

Paula: SoD's scantily-clad damsel in distress. Her unfortunate 'Groundhog Day' death sequences border on the perverse.

SoD is the sordid love child of creative powerhouses Suda 51 and Shinji Mikami. If the names don't ring a bell, the games these guys have made certainly will. Their collective body of work is nothing short of genius: Killer 7, No More Heroes, Devil May Cry, Vanquish, Resident Evil. A collaboration between these two men was always going to produce a quirky, oddball videogame. And hey, I wouldn't have wanted it any other way. That would be like teaming up Jospeh Fritzl and Fred West and expecting them NOT to rape and murder children.

But a game cannot live on lunacy alone. There has to be a solid game mechanic underpinning the joyful nonsense. Thankfully, SOD provides. At its core beats the heart of an old-school shoot-em-up. The game thunders along at a cracking pace and rarely deviates from its monster-killing agenda. And this proves to be the games greatest strength. There's no doubting that sandbox shooters like Halo are ace. The Silent Cartographer remains to this day a pinnacle of level design. But sometimes you just can't beat a bit of mindless carnage, especially when it's as well executed as this.

Your arsenal is eccentric but limited, a commendable design decision that suits the frantic corridor encounters. You never have to cycle through a burgeoning selection of weapons. A quick tap of the D-Pad and you're ready to pop demon skulls. Your pistol, shotgun and machine-gun are modified as the game progresses. Your Skullcussioner, for example, can be charged to fire off a cannon ball sized grenade, which at one point in the game must be used as a bowling ball in a particularly macabre frame of skittles.

Successfully line up a head shot and  you're treated to a lovely slo-mo instakill.

Each gun also has a secondary firing mode called the light shot, which performs a twofold function: Illuminating darkened areas by shooting wall mounted goat-heads and blasting enemies veiled by shadow to stun them into vulnerability. And it's this day/night mechanic that provides the meat of Shadow's gameplay. Whenever Garcia is plunged into darkness his health slowly begins to deteriorate and enemies become invulnerable. A light source must be located before the walking damned and your ailing health-bar conspire to do you in. Sometimes, however, you must embrace the darkness in order to illuminate enemy weak spots and solve simple puzzles.

On your journey through the Shadows of The Damned you'll encounter a mind boggling array of oddness, as if the creative minds behind it were hell bent on freaking you out, haphazardly lobbing in idea after idea without any real regard for your sanity. A Marcus Fenix clone with only 30 seconds of screen time? Check! A turret section in which your gun calls a sex line to enlarge itself? Check! An eight foot demon called Christopher who sells you items amid the lurid glow of illuminated vegetation? Check! Random 2D side-scrolling segments? Check! It's all here, all jostling for your attention in this hyper-gothic world of the damned.

The 2D sections break up the relentless monster-slaying with, erm,  more monster slaying.

Yes, there are criticisms to me made. Some will baulk at the innuendo and crude humour, the way in which the game's scantily clad damsel in distress is regularly ogled by the camera. And once you've completed it, you may feel there is little incentive to return. I managed to snag 45 out of the 50 achievements on my first play through.

But rather than piss and moan at the puerile idiocy of SoD, I embraced it. I enjoyed it. And I urge you to so the same. Ignore the snooty naysayers and treat yourself to a deliciously absurd slice of escapism.

Beyond Sense & Stupidity

It's happened again. Yet another brilliant game marred by the shitty control options.

Beyond Good & Evil, in what can only be described as a glaring oversight, has failed to include the option to invert the y axis.

Instead, we are given the choice to ‘reverse’ the ‘look mode’. Opting for this control set-up inverts BOTH the x and y axis. There is no alternative.

Criminally overlooked when it was released eight years ago, this was Ubisoft’s golden opportunity to reintroduce a classic to a new generation. The game combines elements from multiple genres, including stealth, platform action and detective puzzling, and even inspired Bioshock with its photography mechanism. There are some games that every gamer on the planet should experience. This is one of them.

My advice: trial before you buy. If you’re willing to re-educate your thumbs there’s a cracking game here. But for many the constrictive controls will be a barrier to purchase.

And, for me, that is beyond acceptability.

Assassin's Creed 2 Review

Roof hopping wop stabs his way around Renaissance Italy. That’s all you need to know about the plot. The finer details of the storyline simply distract from the fun. If you want to ponder the existential implications of prolonged exposure to virtual worlds then go watch The Matrix.

Assassin’s Creed 2, stripped of its confusing narrative, is simply a big old climbing frame. The whole of Italy is your parkour-friendly playground upon which you are encouraged to free-run until the soles of your feet bleed. Every last square inch of concrete can be clambered up, swung from, and jumped off. You see that eagle soaring above that impossibly high cathedral tower? You can go and stroke him if you fancy it.

And while you’re up there why not take in the view. The town stretches out for miles in all directions, a boxy maze of rooftops and sky. The hectic hustle and bustle of the streets below are muted by the whooshing of the wind in your ears. You can spend hours without your feet ever touching the ground, simply watching the world go by. It’s intoxicating stuff. But it's the violence where Assassin's Creed 2 really shines.

Bloody murder is woven into every thread of the game. From the brutal intimacy of a hidden-blade gut-stab to the epic frenzy of warring factions, Assassin’s Creed 2 spills claret by the gallon. Murdered parents, horribly botched assassination attempts, religious genocide – it’s all here. Nothing censored, nothing hidden. And I can’t recall any other video game in history that shows the public execution of a young boy. The last video game taboo – the killing of children – has now been broken. How the Daily Mail missed that one I’ll never know.

It’s ambitious then, in both scale and subject matter. Possibly the most ambitious game of its generation. And it rarely places a foot wrong. The transition from balletic urban athlete to deadly assassin is seamless. You’re never impeded by poor level design or muddled controls. Canny visual cues - pigeons indicate jump off points for those stunning leaps of faith, while anything draped in a white sheet signifies the starting spot for a free-run – mean you never have to stop and think about which button to push next. It’s natural, free flowing and awesomely empowering.

For all its intuitive brilliance though, Assassins Creed 2 does have its faults. Missions where you shadow a specific target can be extremely slow-paced and tedious. Towards the end of the game you’ll have accumulated a huge mountain of cash. Having already purchased everything you'll ever need a fair while back, your accrued wealth is now entirely useless. It just keeps on piling up - a grotesque parody of our bank accounts in the real world. And it’s just a tad on the easy side too. Yes, it’ll take you a good solid week to complete, triple that time if you decide to collect all the feathers, treasure chests and hieroglyphs, but you’ll rarely find yourself suffering a fatal blow from a guard’s sword. But, again, maybe that’s just down to the solid controls.

The biggest bugbear for many however will be the game’s lethargic start. Indeed AC2 takes its own sweet time to get going. You can blame the devs for the slow pacing. In their desire for the player to spend more time with Ezio as a carefree adolescent, they’ve created an intro devoid of incident. The action hungry gamer is left champing at the bit in frustration – 'JUST GET ON WITH IT FOR FUCK’S SAKE!'

Not me though. Some of our best loved games have been slow burners. Take Ocarina Of Time. It took a fair old while for our hero Link to leave Kokiri Village and face the epic splendour of Hyrule Field. In many ways AC2 is the spiritual successor to the Ocarina Of Time: Galloping over vast green fields on a tireless stallion; locking onto enemies before clashing swords; plundering loot from beautifully designed dungeons, or simply watching the rising sun burn the morning mist away – AC2 ticks many of the boxes that made Miyamoto’s offering an instant classic.

So then, game of the year? For me, yes. In fact I’d go so far as to say Assassin’s Creed 2 is the best single player experience of this generation. Go buy. Now.

And, yes, that sarky English twat is indeed Danny Wallace.

New Super Mario Bros Wii Review.

Nope, ‘fraid not chaps. There’s nowt here to rival the brain melting riot of originality that burst on to the SNES twenty years ago in the form of Super Mario World. Twenty long years - a cavernous period of time that has seen Nintendo release the N64, Gamecube and Wii - and we are STILL waiting for a 2D platformer to topple SMW from its lofty perch in the clouds.

New Super Mario Bros Wii is by no means a disaster. How could it be? It’s the spiritual sequel to the best 2D platformer ever made. Yes, it lacks the traditional Mario charm and, yes, it’s too easy (okay, not the tear inducing 9-7), but you’ll enjoy it nonetheless, more so if you block out the giddy delights of its SNES forbear.

Unsurprisingly it’s the newest addition to the game that proves the most fun. Multiplayer, a mode I usually shun, got a thoroughly good seeing to this time round - a testament to Mario's universal appeal. Roping in a couple of playmates is never a problem when you mention the ubiquitous Italian chubster. Faces light up and eyes mist over with childhood nostalgia. That mystical Mario allure has yet to wane after all these years. And, yes, bouncing around the Mushroom Kingdom with a few friends in tow is as fun as it sounds. An air of happy cooperation illuminates the first 30 mins of playtime together. Sharing power ups, boosting a chum to reach a Star Coin, piggybacking a weaker player over tricky terrain - all these wonderful moments of teamwork are integral to the happy, shiny, let's-be-friends feel.

Inevitably the love does not last long. Mischievous tom-foolery soon takes over. Every tactic used in the spirit of collaboration is quickly turned on its head. Stop a pal from pinching a preferred power up by lobbing him into some lava, or force him to play catch up by zooming on ahead. Yes indeedy, there are plenty of ways to ruin it for everyone else and you'll try every single one of them.

Multiplayer is fun, no doubt. But without a few chums to share in the high jinks the levels feel soulless and empty. To truly appreciate the potential for mutliplayer mayhem take a peek inside Princess Peach's Castle. The jaw dropping 'super skills' locked within showcase the astounding tricks and acrobatics that four hardcore platform fans can pull off. Some of the stunts are truly mind blowing. Same goes for the 'endless one ups'. There are some ingenious ways to clock up extra lives, feats of digit crippling dexterity you'd simply never have thought of yourself. Watching these videos is like searching youtube for all those quirky 'look what I can do' clips posted by the public. They also draw attention to the meticulously planned level design and reveal a depth to the gameplay that might have otherwise been overlooked.

Some welcome additions then but nothing like the ground pounding triumph we've been waiting so long for. Me thinks a little context is in order here, a peek into the past to put this game in to perspective.

It took a decade for Nintendo to better Mario 64, but Galaxy was worth the wait. And after 12 years we’re finally due a Zelda that’ll stand shoulder to shoulder with the mighty Ocarina Of Time.

The Big N is renowned for lavishing its most cherished franchises with generous periods of development time. It’s why their end products are often modern day masterpieces. Bum numbing delays are tolerable if, at the end of it all, we have a Galaxy to gawp at. But twenty years? For this? Fuck me, no. Too little, too late.

Interesting NSMBW fact

Red Faction Guerrilla Review

If this Youtube video gives you the horn, I’d suggest purchasing Red Faction Guerrilla.

Standing knee-deep in rubble as the world collapses around your ears – this, dear reader, is the definition of balls-out masculinity. Forget Master Chief. All Alec Mason needs to save the day is a sledgehammer and a pair of bollocks the size of wrecking balls.

Any criticisms about the hackneyed plot fade in to insignificance once you’ve levelled your first chimney stack. Five well-placed blows from your sledgehammer – surely the most satisfying and tactile tool in the history of gaming – and down it comes. Destruction is the name of the game. And it’s destruction on a vast, unending scale, with an increasingly devastating arsenal of weapons at your disposal.

Verdict
At long last! The question that’s been puzzling scientists and pop stars alike can finally be answered: YES, there IS life on Mars. And thankfully, Mars is a fucking hoot. To save your planet, you have to blow it up! How gloriously barmy.

Borderlands Review

This is my rifle. There are many like it but this one is mine.

Guns. Millions of guns. Thunder spewing sniper rifles. Scoped shotties. Explosive SMGs. Borderlands is a first person shooter devoted entirely to the quest for the perfect boom stick. Every plundered weapons cache represents the infinite potential for superior fire power. Each slaughtered outlaw gives birth to yet more torso shredding artillery. This is hardcore gun porn to sate even the lustiest firearm nut.

With such a staggering choice of randomly generated weaponry, 17,750,000 at the last count, comes the monumental chore of stat comparison; armpit burning frustation as you evaluate yet another Assault Rifle. Lost in a mess of maps, missions, stats and upgrades, the gunplay, so utterly crucial to the game, often takes a back seat. Slowly, but surely, you’ll acclimatise. By level 20, you’ll know at a glance which guns to keep and which to discard or sell. And then you can concentrate on killing.

And, cor blimey, is there a lot of killing. Borderlands is a vast, lawless junkyard of bondage-clad bandits and vicious beasties. The plot, trite in the extreme (but who cares!), is to find a sacred vault, believed to contain unfathomable wealth. Along the way you’ll be inundated with side quests, sometimes 8 at a time, by the grotesque inhabitants of Pandora. 160 side quests in all and every single one of them a kill, fetch or find expedition. All of them! Without exception. But it’s cool, no sweat. You’ve got your guns to keep you company.

Guns. Millions of guns. With such cool names. Pestilent Defiler. Brutal Viper. Bloody Equalizer. Cruel Repeater. Each gun a unique metal snowflake with more character and emotional appeal than Pandora’s entire human population. The Sentinal, for example, a beautifully striped red and black Assault Rifle, like Dennis the Menace, complete with awesome scope sight, stunning accuracy and battery acid bullets. You’ll be loathe to part with some of your guns. But, eventually, you will relinquish them in favour of the next metal minx that flashes her ample stats in your direction.

Halo 3 ODST: Trick Or Treat?

Forget Derren Brown and his monumentally abysmal attempts at hoodwinking the general public. If you really want a master class in misdirection you need look no further than Halo 3: ODST.

The visor is pointless, a total ruse. Accidentally equipping it in a well lit arena will plunge you into an eyeball searing world of blinding white light. Used as intended, to illuminate the terminally miserable hub world, it soon becomes clear that the visor is nothing more than a superfluous pair of night vision goggles. They are perhaps the most gratuitous addition to the halo universe. So why include them? Without the gimmick of a shiny new visor, Halo ODST has absolutely nothing new to offer the dedicated campaign player.

The absence of Master Chief neither enhances nor detracts from the overall experience. His exclusion is a non event. To the untrained eye you may as well be playing as a Spartan. The superficial tweaks that are meant to promote a sense of human frailty are nothing but an acute irritation. Hunting for medipacks is a nuisance.

But it’s the incessant, nagging bleeping and the lingering red mist that descends when your life force is low that really tires the soul. The diminished jump and the weakened melee attack, although frustrating, are forgivable. They help focus the player’s attention on the weapons. And, yes, the modified pistol is a joy.

The hub world is a gloomy distillation of everything we’ve grown to dislike about Halo, namely the uninspired labyrinths of identical corridors. Without the vivid alien vistas that made Halo 3 so pleasing to the eye, ODST’s hub is just a forgettable sandbox of concrete blocks. The visor, a necessity unless you want to explore the streets of Mombassa in darkness, transforms the industrial murk into an abstract world of glowing neon contours. Yes, it’s pretty, but it feels lazy, an excuse to churn out the same indistinguishable streets and buildings.

And so it falls to Firefight to save the day. If ODST’s hub world is the embodiment of everything that made Halo a chore, Firefight is the exact opposite. Enclosed in arenas of varying size, Firefight spawns an endless supply of Covenant and an endless supply of weapons with which to kill them. Until you finally succumb. It’s the most pleasant war of attrition you’ll ever experience. Firefight achieves, with great success, what the campaign promised but failed to deliver: a feeling of comradeship with your fellow ODST’s.

Without the option to Firefight into infinity and beyond, Halo ODST is nothing more than a stunning sleight of hand.

FEAR 2: Project Origin Review

It’s pretty obvious what you’re letting yourself in for. The game is called FEAR – the developer's intentions are crystal clear: they want to scare you. And the box art is dominated by an ethereal little girl - Alma - who looks suspiciously like that freaky Japanese lass from The Ring.

The biggest tell, however, comes before you’ve even started playing. Whenever a game prompts you to “adjust the brightness until the onscreen symbol is barely visible”, you just know that the next 6-8 hours will be spent bracing yourself for the next cheap scare in a dimly lit corridor. That’s not to say it isn’t fun though.

Becket, the protagonist you control, is introduced via a lurid hallucination which sees him following the flickering ghost of Alma through a ruined city. You wake from this sepia-drenched nightmare surrounded by your squad. You’re all in an armoured combat vehicle, trundling towards your first mission - investigating a Penthouse for supernatural activity.

As with all the interior settings in FEAR, the Penthouse is a sprawling complex of meticulously detailed rooms and corridors. You’ll find yourself pushing open door after door, never knowing quite what you’ll find behind each of them. You might stumble upon an empty bathroom complete with tiny, complimentary bars of soap. Or you might uncover a blood spattered laundry room and a severed head bouncing around in one of the washing machines. It’s the pornographic attention to detail that evokes a real ‘lived-in’ quality to your surroundings. Which makes tearing them with up your machine gun all the more satisfying.

With a control set-up pilfered directly from COD 4, carving up the enemy is never a chore. Hold L1 to stare down the barrel of your gun and R1 to pump out the rounds – simple. The D-Pad is fully utilised with each direction performing a crucial function: UP – torch, RIGHT – toggle weapons, DOWN – Medikit, LEFT – toggle grenades. It all works well and after half an hour feels pretty intuitive. You’ll stick to the weapons you know and love, namely the machine guns, shotguns and sniper rifles. The Rocket Launcher is cumbersome and the futuristic lasers are ineffective and no fun to use. As are the grenades – it’s simply too hard to judge where they're going to land.

The games biggest weakness, however, is the tiny cast of enemies. You’re either shooting an identikit soldier or dodging a mutated freak. There’s no real sense of character, like the brutes in Halo 3 who constantly shift their group dynamic, call out to each other and try everything in their power to flush you out. Okay, the occasional soldier may upend a table for cover and robotically bleat out a phrase like, ‘he’s behind the crates’, but that’s about the extent of their limited repertoire. The only characters worth noting are, unsurprisingly, the freaky supernatural ones.

Replica Assassins are small ninja-like soldiers – very fast and extremely agile. You’ll only notice them when their cloaking device temporarily distorts the space around them. Happily, you have just the thing needed to catch them out. A quick tap of Y initiates your ‘reflex’ skill – this is essentially a device that slows down time. Once activated you’ll be able to see these deadly little assassins in all their balletic grace and beauty – more importantly you’ll now be able to blast them in the face.

Scarier still are the Remnants. Protruding from their bloated bodies are glowing red tentacles which they use as strings to puppeteer nearby corpses into attacking you. Watching these horrific marionettes dance to the tune of their malevolent master is quite a sight. Just make sure you keep your distance.

FEAR can be characterised by its painfully long segments of quiet exploration and its sudden, chaotic bouts of supernatural horror. The schizophrenic back and forth between lengthy spells of silence and short bursts of terror really jangle the nerves. In one sweat-inducing set-piece you’ll find yourself armed only with a torch - a cruel imposition and no mistake. Hardcore veterans of the FPS genre will feel especially vulnerable without the comforting sight of a shotgun barrel in front of them. It’s a nice twist to an established formula. Any game that strips you of your weapons and forces you down a corpse-strewn corridor with just a failing torch for protection knows exactly how to elicit those atavistic feelings of fear we’d simply rather not experience.

All of FEAR’s locations seem to blur seamlessly into one another. It feels like you’re trapped inside a labyrinthine underground complex, and after a while it all becomes a little oppressive and overbearing. Think Fallout 3, specifically those deserted underground subways, and you’ll have a good idea of what to expect. When you’ve spent 8 hours searching yet another empty room by the light of your torch, you start to feel the clammy hand of claustrophobia clawing at your throat - not pleasant. But perhaps FEAR’s dev team would argue that this crushing oppressiveness has precisely the intended effect.

Verdict
Best approached with the lights off and the sound up. As a £5.95 rental from blockbusters, FEAR 2 is an absolute bargain.

GTA Chore

What the fuck?

Ten minutes into the game and I’m already being hassled by some neurotic, date-obsessed singleton called Michelle. Her exasperating requests for companionship almost always come at a time when I’m already bogged down in some corrupt dealings with a local crime lord.
So what do I do?

If I ignore her I can expect the icy rebuke of a woman scorned. And if I indulge her I risk severing lucrative connections with the underground crime scene. Decisions, decisions…

Fuck it, I’ll go with Michelle.

But where in the name of Christ should I take her? I’ve just blown out a yardie gangster for this daft bint so I need to make sure I at least get in her good books. But the list of things to do is daunting: restaurant, bar, darts, pool, bowling, comedy club, magic show…

Bowling. I’ll go with bowling.

Okay, the date went well. It’s time to take her home. Should I ‘press my luck’ or simply ‘drop her off and leave’?

ENOUGH ALREADY!

All I wanted to do when I threw GTA IV into my 360 was bludgeon a pimp to death with a baseball bat, and now I’m bogged down with a list of tedious decisions I’ve got to make in order to appease the inane whims of some clingy virtual girlfriend.

GTA Phwoar!

My initial reaction was unfair.

I’ve been playing this game for the past week now and my opinion has changed dramatically. Me thinks there’s a humble pie in the fridge for dessert...
I still find the numerous decisions that GTA 4 asks you to make in the opening segments of the game to be tedious. But I soon discovered that choice - the ability to indulge or ignore certain people and events - is absolutely essential to one’s level of emotional involvement.

So, what exactly do I mean by this?

Well, take Michelle for example. Yes, at first you want to strangle the neurotic, date-obsessed singleton, especially when the daft bint phones during a mission. But, if like me, you actually put the effort in and date this woman, you’ll find yourself that little bit more miffed with the revelation that she is in fact a government informant. Ok, it’s not the plot twist of the century, or even the week for that matter, but your level of involvement with Michelle leading up to this moment will certainly effect your reaction.

And how about the decision you have to make when asked to assassinate either Playboy X or Dwayne?

I genuinely couldn’t decide who to take out. I ended up murdering Playboy. And you know what? There’s been a lingering sense of doubt ever since that I just can’t seem to shake.

Did I make the right choice?

It’s exactly this uncertainty, prompted by a decision that I made, that creates the illusion of something greater, something that I desperately wanted GTA IV to be.

And I haven’t even touched upon the bloody miraculous birds-eye view of Liberty City from the helicopter you get to fly, the Heat inspired bank heist (squeal!), the motorbike chases along the coast or the squelchy footprints you leave in the sand.

You have to be bit of a tit if you can’t appreciate the gratuitous level of incidental detail that Rockstar has managed to squeeze onto one disc.

I sat and watched Ricky Gervais doing stand-up on a virtual TV within my actual TV for fucks sake.

How bloody absurd/amazing is that?

The Worst Game On The Wii

The relative popularity of daytime game show Golden Balls is born entirely out of the enjoyment viewers derive from the bluffing aspect of the game. As the all-important cash pot builds, the player's urge to bluff increases and so tensions between the contestants intensifies.

The game's final showdown involves the remaining two players deciding whether or not they want to share or split the accumulated pot: cue the outrageous bluffing. Or maybe not. It's exactly this uncertainty as to the player's true intentions that gets the viewing public tuning in.

Strip away the fundamental components that give the game show any semblance of credibility and you're left with Golden Balls the videogame. With no actual cash to lend it a sense of peril and no human opponent to try and read or bluff, 'playing' Golden Balls becomes the ultimate exercise in futlility. If you make it through to the final round and both you and your opponent opt to 'steal', then the host, Jasper, imparts some real words of wisdom: "Having got this far, today has been a waste of time".

My thoughts exactly.

House of The Dead Overkill Review

After two frigid years of celibacy, the Wii has finally lost its virginity. Overkill snatches No More Hero’s trophy as the Wii’s most mature title and shoves it so far up Travis Touchdown’s backside that he’ll need his beam katana to cut it free. Make no mistake, for truly adult content, Overkill delivers.

But as tempting as this zombie holocaust is, don’t let its gory allure be the sole reason that you part with your cash. Because - and it pains me to say this - there is a lot to criticise. Veteran Nintendo heads have been crying out for a game just like this: a silly, sweary, blood n’ guts romp that treats its audience to some grown up naughtiness. And while Overkill ticks all the right boxes for a night of virtual sleaze it does very little else. Sadly, it seems, Sega forgot one vital ingredient: good old fashioned playability.

First under the cosh are the graphics. Overkill is a no nonsense on-rails shooter. So, you’d imagine that Sega, having little else to do but guide you through its set locations, could have concentrated on delivering some truly eye-popping scenery. Unfortunately the locations could not have been more drab and generic. Overkill drags you through cliché after cliché: hospital, prison, fairground, laboratory … you get the picture. Worse still are the shocking technical issues that mar the game. Slowdown occasionally creeps in, disrupting the unbroken flow of zombie killing and resetting your hard earned combos. There were even times when the game simply stopped working. Shocking.

Next up: longevity. Overkill is over in a couple of hours. Incentive to replay is limited to the uninspiring extras made available by completing certain objectives. Combo fanatics will undoubtedly relish stringing together kill after kill to the satisfying aural cue of ‘Psychotic!’, but there’s little skill involved in reaching the top score slots. Link's Crossbow Training is a far better example of how to implement and reward combos in on-rail shooters.

Those of you hoping to rope a mate into some hardcore murderation will also feel the unpleasant pinch of disappointment. With two cursors simultaneously scanning the screen, zombies evaporate into red mist as soon as their broken bodies shuffle into view. There is absolutely no sense of accomplishment. And trying to clock up combos in the confusing maelstrom of flying limbs and severed heads is simply not an option. It’s fun for 20 minutes of mindless mayhem but any longer than that and it feels as though you’re playing a point and click mouse game.

Overkill’s one saving grace is its option to ‘dual wield’. Pick up two remotes and dish out twice the death. At first, your brain will struggle and combos will be lost as your non-gaming hand jerks involuntarily away from its target. Persevere though, and you’ll be gun slinging like Jesse James. Two simultaneous headshots? Yes please! The ability to dual wield should now be a standard setting in all of Wii’s on rails shooters.

For everything that Overkill gets wrong it’s still, unarguably, a step in the right direction for adult gaming on the Wii. And for now at least, that’s good enough for me.