Bioshock 2: Intitail Thoughts

I do not power play. By that I mean I don't get a game and sit at my TV until I beat it. I have a friend that does that and it is a skill that constantly eludes me. I practice it constantly but fail at every attempt. I have recently begun playing Bioshock 2 and while very, very early into it, so far I'm not impressed yet. So far the game isn't really lacking in any technical aspects other than graphics, but it still seems to be lacking in something. I could be remembering wrong but it seemed like Bioshock uno (one in Spanish)had better graphics. It seems odd that there would be a technical step backwards like that but, like I said, its been sometime since I played the first so maybe I'm remembering wrong. I'll look into it.

So far the primary flaw with Bioshock 2 is not any thing having to do with Bioshock 2 other than the fact that it is a sequel to a game that really has a hard time having a sequel. Do you remember what it was like entering Raptor the first time? There was that awesome feeling as the bathosphere decended into the ocean and their before was Raptor. You had no idea what to expect and everything from the walking through the glass hallways under the ocean to discovering what was going on was completely fascinating and thrilling. Once the mystery is gone and Raptor exposed and explored I feel like it looses some of its luster. Bioshock 2 plays well but you can't help but feel like you're watching Indian Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls. Yeah its Indaina but the soul seems to be gone.

This is not a review yet, just thoughts.

This is not

Thoughts On HEAVY RAIN

No, I have not played Heavy Rain. I have played the demo but that gives me little room to give it a review, however, I will give my thoughts on it from my limited perspective.

First: Gamers seem to go ga-ga over stuff like this. There is a group of gamers that love to see games like Heavy Rain, in other words, Games that focus heavily on story and present a gritty or "mature" attitude towards gaming because the feel like it validates gaming as a legitimate art and hobby. Some gamers love to be able to point at a game like Heavy Rain or Shadow of The Colossus and say; "See, see games are deep and profound and should be more accepted as art and not just as nerd media." Personally I love games and I don't care how legit the appear to be to the maintstream or the artsy media community. If you do, I have nothing against that but be careful not to accept something sub-par just because you are eager for the idea it presents.

Second: Nearly all of the reviews I have read on the game mention little of the gameplay. The bulk of the reviews gush over the great story and mood of the game. Most of the reviews look like movie reviews. My friends I want more than a movie when I pay $60, I want a game. One that I can replay or at least invest 10-15 hours in. There are plenty of games out their, Shadow of the Colossus as already mentioned among them, that have great story and have better gameplay then Heavy Rain. Does Heavy Rain have a great story? Probably, but did it need to sacrifice gameplay to do that? No. It is utter nonsense to accept a game's lacking gameplay mechanics because its story is so good. In a video game story cannot make up for the primary component of a game, the game part. If this game were $20 then yes, I'd be all over it, but $60 for a great story and some prompt button mashing to fight or even climb up a hill, really? Have we let our standards drop so much? I suspect that we haven't and for this reason I suspect the game will sell "okay" but not make any waves because gamers still want games, not interactive story discs. But, again, I have not played it, so I could be totally wrong.

Games can evolve and they can have great story and they can have great gameplay. And for that price tag on games we should expect that.

Assassin's Creed 2 Value Score: $30

Sometimes it takes me awhile to get to a game I want to play due to money and/or time constraints. First thing is first, it took me roughly 15 hours to play through the game. Those 15 hours include getting 80% of the discoverables. That includes finding all the high points in the game, upgrading the town 100%, finding the videos and codexes etc.....

To be clear, I think 15 hours is a pretty good amount of gameplay for most games. You play through the game as an Assassin doing assassin things, ya know, killing and climbing and hanging out with prostitutes. To be honest the story is pretty blah for the most part but I suspect most people are playing this game with the purpose of assassinating and exploring in mind. Prepare for that and not so much the story. The story doesn't really go anywhere until the end. You begin the story in Florence and there are several smaller towns you can go to until you finish the game in Venice, the largest of the areas.

Now to the nitty gritty. I said that I would value this game at $30. Its not a bad game but it suffers the problem that most sandbox and sandbox-like games suffer, repetitiveness. Through the first 10 hours or so the games is pretty fun. And by the that I mean the first hour is so boring it made me want to swallow a Raccoon. Once you slog through the setup the game starts to become more fun. You get your assassin gear and you start a'killing but all of you moves are not unlocked. It seems that the main character, Ezio, can figure out how to pull a man off a roof until he gets further along in the game. In AC 1 you were given more abilities as you were given your equipment back. In AC 2 your character is simply to dumb to figure it out himself. It doesn't really bother me but it seems arbitrary and personally I would have enjoyed all of his skills at once. It seemed to artificial and forced to create this gameplay evolution. Its as if Ubisoft knew games classically have had a similar pattern of increased power with increased progress through a game and implemented it without thinking. However, as I said before, this didn't really bother me.

Your City and You

You get a villa that you can add on to. Its a great element to the game that holds of the seemingly inevitable repetitiveness that will soon over run the meager defenses of the sandbox game. Your villa starts of run down...what ever will you do? Do not fear for you dilapidated home away from killing for you are provided with a full time architect. As you gain money you can improve and add things to your city that in turn raise the income from the city and give you discounts on goods bought there. Along with this you also can collect all of the weapons and art in the game and have them on display in your villa, after you have cleaned all the blood and brains off of course. This gives you a great feeling of "more" to the game outside of the constant killing and while simple and easy (there is no real strategy and you can upgrade the city very fast)it provides a nice change of pace. But like I said (see over run defense comment above) the game gets repetitive and begins to drag on a bit. Ubisoft did a great job of mixing up the levels and making each task a little different. Unfortunately, they all really just boil down to either kill some guards, follow someone or kill a High Value Target.

The game is fun, but if you have limited income like I do then I say rent it. You can beat it in a week with some dedication. If you want to own, you will likely find little reason to replay it anytime soon but my value for it is around $30.

How To Read This Blog

The Premise of this blog is to write game reviews from a normal Gamer that loves videos games. Too often I have found that game websites write reviews from a skewed perspective. Sometimes its because of the time limit the reviewers are given for the actual gameplay and other times it seems that reviewers may have a hard time seeing the value of a game from the "layman's" perspective, considering they don't have to pay for the games the review. I like video games. I like playing them. I don't like spending $60 on game only to find out it is six hours long or that it is a game made up of three game elements played out over and over again. Driving me so crazy with its repetitive nature it makes me want to cut open my head and punch my brain for allowing the purchase. I like my brain (well, at very least my brain and I have a standing agreement) so I try and avoid this.

I will not assign letter grades or give numerical values to games. I find that while they can be accurate it is better to present my opinions through value. A game I would pay full price for is a great game. Paying full price for a game means I am sacrificing purchasing other games for this game because I am willing to spend to so much for it. This is the best way I have been able to convey the quality and "must have"ness of a game. So I start by assuming all games are worth full price and then chip away at them revealing the flaws I see until all that is left is the real value and price I would pay.