Category: FPS

Poll: What’s Your Current Game of the Year?

Seeing as how we’re almost five months into the glorious year of 2011, and given that we’ve already seen a slew of quality releases, I thought I’d conduct an informal poll (TWSS) and find out what your current Game of the Year is.

While we do have a few luminary titles coming at us in a few weeks, the recent release of Portal 2 gave us undoubtedly one of this year’s critical juggernauts. Gaming is for all types though, so maybe you liked something else? Let us know which game you’re rooting for in this handy-dandy poll we cooked up. Chances are, you’ll like a game with the number “2” in it. Just a guess.

For anyone wondering why I picked these games, I basically selected big ticket titles over a score of 87 on Metacritic. If you’d like me to add something else, please let me know in the comments!

What's Your Current Game of the Year for 2011?

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Is Valve Done with Single Player Games?

Half Life 2 Episode 2

Interesting. I’m not sure if you guys have heard about Geoff Keighley’s The Final Hours of Portal 2 app for the iPad, but it sounds like a fascinating look into the development of Portal 2, particularly the last few weeks before it was done. Keighley was given a staggering amount of access to Valve, much like when he covered the Final Hours of Half-Life 2, and I’ve heard the results are phenomenal.

On top of being a remarkable piece of journalism, it seems that Keighley reports on a few choice remarks from Gabe Newell himself, particularly about the future of Valve when it comes to single player gaming. Apparently, Here’s what Keighley had to say:

“Portal 2 will probably be Valve’s last game with an isolated single-player experience… What this all means is something Newell is still trying to figure out.”

Apparently, he heard this from Newell during his time at Valve. Considering Valve’s track record seems to be skewing towards more multiplayer and co-op focused games, it doesn’t surprise me that much. However, it does make me curious about what the future could hold for a title like Half-Life 2: Episode 3…

So what do you guys think about this quote and about its implications? Is it just the gaming press getting out of hand? Or could you see there being something to this idea? It should be noted that Valve allowed Keighley to publish whatever he wanted with no limitations as soon as Portal 2 was done, so it’s very likely that he did in fact hear this straight from Gabe’s mouth.

Thoughts?

Source – Kotaku

GamerSushi Asks: What Genres Do You Suck At?

sucking at marvel vs capcom 3

How’s your holiday weekend going, GamerSushi-ites? Me, I’ve been tucking into the Gears of War 3 beta again after doing a marathon Portal 2 session where I polished off the whole game, both single and co-op. I’m pretty sure that we’re going to do a “What Are You Playing” sometime this weekend, so we’ll table that discussion for later. Segueing from that, I am planning on checking out Mortal Kombat soon, which frightens me mostly because fighting games are one of the genres that I totally suck at.

To be totally honest, in a multiplayer standpoint, I’m really only good at first person shooters. Even though I’m loving the Gears 3 gameplay, I’ll admit that my Kill/Death ratio is pretty terrible, with one often outpacing the other (guess which one). The same thing goes for real time strategy games, where I can maybe hold my own in a campaign or a comp stomp scenario, but once I get out into the wild, everything just goes right down the tubes.

All that pales in comparison to how badly I perform at fighting games like Street Fighter, Marvel vs Capcom 3, Tekken and the like. I’ll maybe win the odd round, but more often than not I’m getting Hadoukened back to last week.

It’s rare that anyone admits that they’re bad at games, but we’re all friends here, so go ahead and let us know what genres you aren’t that great with. Fighting, racing, shooting? Drop them comment bombs, yo.

The Joy of Rediscovering Games

Halo: Combat Evolved PC Version

I was combing through one of the boxes I had been dragging around with me in my various moves in the past year and was pleasantly surprised when I found my copy of Halo: Combat Evolved for the PC. I have Halo for the Xbox, true, but this version of it is a little more rare, almost to the point of mythical status. I put that sucker in my laptop and found out that I can run it, so I’ve been playing through that the last couple of days and having a blast.

Previously, a similar thing happened when I found a GameBoy Color and a copy of Pokemon Red which rekindled my Pokemon obsession, so I was wondering if anything similar has happened to you guys. I know that in the day and age of digital distribution, where publishers pimp out older games to prey on our nostalgia, finding older games is easier than it has been, but happening upon a treasured game from your youth and the proper system to play it on is nothing short of a miracle.

So what about you? Have you stumbled onto a game that you thought was lost? What was it? Go!

GamerSushi Asks: Would You Play an MMO Shooter?

Brink

Ever since the wild success of WoW, MMOs have been the apple of every major publisher’s eye. They all want one, they’re all desperate to have one, but it turns out that making lightning strike twice is a bit trickier than anyone could have imagined. Note the sarcasm, there.

However, Paul Wedgewood, CEO of Splash Damage (currently working on the awesome-looking FPS Brink), feels that there is a large portion of the market untapped when it comes to MMOs. Specifically, he’s wondering why there aren’t any major MMO FPS games.

“You know, for a long time it hasn’t been technically feasible because you need super low latency connections for good shooter combat and that’s generally incompatible with 1000 people being on a server at the same time… But there are enough solutions around now so that it’s reasonably feasible. I know that there are some teams on the periphery working on ideas for this.”

So what do you guys think? I know we’ve got some WoW players here and more than our fair share of FPS gamers. Would you guys play an FPS MMO? Are we at the point where you think a good one is plausible? What do you think would make you take a peek? And is anyone excited about Brink? Go!

Source – CVG

The GamerSushi Show, Ep 26: Nintendo Power

Another week, another podcast. This week’s cast covers the big happenings from last week: namely, the rumors of Nintendo’s new console, as well as the massive-but-actually-less-massive-than-everyone-first-though Portal 2 ARG. We actually kick things off a little differently in this episode, starting first with the game of percentages.

After all of that riveting discussion (and my consequent victory), we dive into a lengthy conversation about our video game level bucket lists, and the levels we think everyone should play before they keel over. I’m curious to see if you guys like the format of the game first, or if you like it the way it’s been. Let us know!

No podcast will be out next week, since it’s a holiday weekend and all. Which saddens me, as it means we’ll have to wait that much longer before giving our Portal 2 impressions.

So, listen. Then rate. And of course, enjoy. Continue reading The GamerSushi Show, Ep 26: Nintendo Power

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Alleged Console Port Causes Portal 2 Backlash

Portal 2 hug

File this under “This is why we can’t have nice things”. Apparently, the Alternate Reality Game that Eddy posted about earlier, along with DLC already available on the day of the game’s launch and rumors of the game being a console port has prompted some raging Metacritic users to emancipate Portal 2 from any true Metacritic User Rating by lowering it’s score. Currently, the game sits at a 6.9, which is far lower than expected from such a hotly anticipated game.

So what exactly is the cause? As 1UP is reporting, the disappointment that the aforementioned ARG was a ploy to get people to buy/play Steam games, along with the alleged short length of the game (I guess they aren’t counting the co-op in this) and the -WAIT FOR IT- “obvious console port clues” was just too much for these monsters to bear. A cursory scan of the comments reveals much hatred for Valve, the likes of which not seen since the days of Left 4 Dead 2.

Just for fun, here’s a quick sampling of some of the comments:
Continue reading Alleged Console Port Causes Portal 2 Backlash

GamerSushi Asks: Portal 2 Roll Call?

Portal 2

Gentlemen and gentleladies, the day is upon us. The day we’ve all been waiting for. The game that we’ve been thinking about for the last two years. SOCOM 4. Wait, nevermind. Mortal Kombat 9, maybe?

Oh. Right. Portal 2. That one. Yeah, I guess that’s on shelves now too, eh?

Kidding aside, I have just returned home with my copy of Portal 2 on the PS3, which, as we all know, comes with a handy dandy Steam key to unlock it on the PC as well. This coincides perfectly with the new PC I’m building this weekend. Right now, the plan is to play the Portal 2 singleplayer component on the PS3, and then switch over to co-op on my new PC once I’m done, since I prefer the headset to the PS3 headset by leaps and bounds. Also, it’s going to be very pretty, I’m sure.

So, I figure it was time for a roll call. Portal 2 is out now on multiple platforms. Do you have it? What platform did you purchase it for? Want to play some co-op? Let’s have some fun.

Gaming Press Gets Firsthand Look at Skyrim

Skyrim Dragon

Skyrim, oh Skyrim. Why you got to look so fantastic?

It seems that the gaming press got an awesome firsthand look at one of this year’s most anticipated releases, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, over the weekend. Multiple outlets are talking about how awesome the game looked in motion, how impressive the new engine was, and the overall improvement of the game’s interface and even NPC interactions. Let it be known that I hate these people for getting to see this game so early.

My favorite preview of the lot would have to be the write-up that Joystiq did. Inside, you’ll find information about how alive the towns looked with NPC activity and the way that combat works (each hand is mapped to a different trigger). However, I think the most curious part of the previews would have to be the description of the dragon attack, which Bethesda swears is completely unscripted.

From the VG247 preview:

Howard made a point by saying that the game’s dragon fights are real-time.

“The dragons, I promise you, are unscripted. I don’t know what he’s going to do, I don’t know where he’s going to go. They are our big boss fights,” he says.

OK, so imagine the cougar from Red Dead Redemption… except it’s a mother effing dragon. Yeah.

Anyway, these previews got me even more jazzed up to get a taste of Skyrim this fall. What are your thoughts?

Source – Joystiq and VG247

Battlefield 3 Full Length Fault Line Trailer is the Best B-Day Gift

How sweet of DICE and EA to drop the full length Battlefield 3 Fault Line trailer a few days early so it coincides with my Birthday. I know this is just a small coincidence, but let me have this, damn it. Following up on the previous three trailers I posted for BF3, this twelve minute numbers shows the action in its entirety with the cuts being reserved for getting you to the action quicker as opposed to just teasing the juicy bits. Enjoy.

Even though we’ve seen most of this before, it still looks amazing. Sure, the dialogue and voice acting are a little ho-hum and the AI of the enemies seems pretty basic, but for an Alpha build DICE really have the destruction mechanics and the graphics nailed down. Are you guys still pumped for BF3?

Player Investment in Multiplayer: A Necessary Evil?

gears of war 3 beta unlocks

The Gears of War 3 beta is coming out next Tuesday, and I get to partake in it thanks to my holding onto the Epic Edition of Bulletstorm. As I was checking out the Gears of War 3 Beta Featurette that Eddy posted a few days ago, I noticed that Epic Games has taken a cue from their fellow developers and added a bit of player customization into the game, namely the ability to paint your weapons with a variety of colors (and a few other treats as well, I’m sure).

In an age where the game trade in business cleans up and publishers are trying to get people to hang onto their games, player investment in multiplayer has become a predictable addition to any big budget title. While Battlefield 2 was the first game I can think of that pioneered this (and I’m holding to that), Call of Duty 4 brought this out in a huge way. Even Halo has had a bit of that with the different armor pieces in Halo 3, and went whole hog with it in Reach.
Continue reading Player Investment in Multiplayer: A Necessary Evil?

GamerSushi Asks: Can You Attach a Number to Art?

Homefront

Ouch. Someone might be sore from a few reviews.

While this post is not going to be another in the inexorably long discussion of whether or not games are art, it does apply to the discussion about how we view art in general. You see, THQ EVP Danny Bilson recently shared some thoughts with IGN about Homefront’s review scores. When asked what he thought of them, Bilson had this to say:

If we were universally panned, I would say “Yeah I guess it didn’t work.” I think the idea of 50 reviews that are so radically spread says that we made a game that has a point of view and that you might even argue is controversial…

Do I prefer that it’s controversial? No, I’d prefer if everybody in the world loved it. But there are 20+ reviews that are over 80, there are some haters, and there are some mid-range ones. Do I read them all to see what we can do better next time and have every review be 100? Of course, our goal is always that. What I will say pretty clearly is the game is not a “71.” You can’t apply math to art.

I haven’t played Homefront, so I’m not going to comment on whether or not Homefront is in fact art, or not. However, this does bring an issue up about how video games are reviewed and scored. Do you guys think that in an artistic medium, it’s alright to attach hard numbers to these games? I mean, Shadow of the Colossus has a 91 attached to it on Metacritic, which to me just seems silly for something that I actually do consider art.

So what do you guys think? Go!

Source – IGN

Valve’s Impressive Portal 2 PotatoFools ARG

Portal 2 ARG

Wow. I’ve seen some impressive Alternative Reality Games before (namely, ILoveBees by Bungie leading up to Halo 2), but Valve’s new endeavor, PotatoFools, has certainly taken the cake… no pun intended.

If you’re unaware, Valve launched the Potato Sack pack of indie games on April 1st. It includes 13 games, features a few Portal 2 themed levels for those games and even some Portal 2 content for Team Fortress 2. However, a few users started noticing something weird about the updates for each of the indie games. A little bit of digging turned up a lofty and epic ARG straight from Valve.

I can’t even begin to describe how everything has gone down, so you should check out the PotatoFools ARG thread over on the Steam Forums for the full break down of all the events since April 1st. Needless to say, it’s absurdly impressive. We’re talking cross game clues, passwords, messages from Gabe Newell himself, anonymous e-mails from employees, a special clue hidden on the side of a building in the Netherlands, a surveillance camera watching the forum user that found the clue, secret frames referencing top ARG players in the newest Portal 2 trailers… and that doesn’t begin to scratch the surface.

The point of all of this? Nobody really knows, although speculation right now is that it’s pointing towards an early release of Portal 2 on Steam for this Friday. Who knows if that’s the case, though.

The funny thing is, I happen to be pals with Matt “LordNed” Hoffman, one of the main driving forces behind collecting information for the ARG (you’ll see him referenced in the thread quite a bit). I asked him what the current status is, and he had this to report:

Several ARG administrators are gone. A couple are acting strange, giving cryptic hints that translate about to “Please help she’s killing me”, a POTATO logo was updated to show a figure inside a portal. A whiteboard states that two people are dead, GLADOS took over the wiki and has control over it.

Yikes. So what do you guys think of all this craziness? Has anyone been following it?

Source – Portal 2 ARG thread on the Steam Forums

Why War Gaming Needs a Break

war gaming needs a breakAt this point in my gaming career, I think I’ve taken back the city of Stalingrad more times than I can count. I’ve fought bad guys in Europe, in space, and saved the world as we know it, all from the view of a lowly grunt in the military. Playing a video game from the perspective of the military is old hat, yet it’s a well that the industry keeps going back to. It’s easy to find an enemy and give your players a reason to go around the globe using all the latest weaponry (or period specific weaponry, depending on the setting), but the thrill is starting to wear out.

I’m ready for developers to move on from the fascination with the armed forces, but the gaming public needs to be on the same page. As long as Call of Duty is the top seller every year, we’re going to keep seeing the arms race between the big publishers as they try to put out their “CoD killer” by emulating it in every way possible. While I don’t think that Call of Duty is exactly killing the industry, it certainly isn’t helping it. Even Battlefield 3, a game that I’ve made my infatuation with clear several times, is hoping to outdo Call of Duty by making a game that’s scripted beyond belief. What can the games industry do to buck this trend?
Continue reading Why War Gaming Needs a Break

The Video Game Level Bucket List

Psychonauts

Is it just me, or do they just not make video game levels the way they used to? A big part of this comes from the fact that most modern video games work in very compact missions. While it makes for a mostly great experience, at times it’s hard to separate key levels that really stand out.

Everyone’s got their own list of favorite video game levels, and GamesRadar has pitched in with one of their old re-posts, 59 Levels to Play Before You Die. It represents a video game level bucket list, of sorts, and I have to say it’s a pretty good one. They cover everything from Assassin’s Creed’s Acre Cathedral to Chrono Cross, Symphony of the Night, Crackdown, Psychonauts and Twisted Metal 2. They’ve even got videos if you’re too lazy or unable to go play them.

We’ve talked before about some excellent video game levels on this site, but if you had a bucket list of levels to play before someone died, what would the top 5 or 10 be? Make your lists! Go!

Source – GamesRadar

Image Source – Ayem

Would You Rather: Developer Edition

It’s time for another edition of your favorite game, Would You Rather. We know how much you like talking about yourselves and all, and that’s cool, because we like it, too.

Our last Would You Rather covered the beginning of 2011, looking forward to the year’s major releases. This edition is going to be the “developer dream job” version, tackling questions about the video game makers we know and love. Since many of you are aspiring video game developers, we thought it would be appropriate to see where your tendencies lie as potential future leaders in the industry.

For the Would You Rather newbies out there, the game is easy: we ask and you dish out your response. Give as much or as little explanation as you want for your choices, but we all know that we like to see the reasoning behind the madness.

Don’t let your answers suck, though. There’s a special blacklist going around on our site for sucky comments. Let’s just say those people get fed to the Sarlacc Nick keeps in his closet. And that thing is hungry. So yeah. Answer well. Go!

Continue reading Would You Rather: Developer Edition

Halo: Reach’s Defiant Map Pack: DLC Worth Paying For

halo reach defiant map pack review

One of the biggest criticisms leveraged against Halo: Reach was the astonishingly low quality of the multiplayer maps included in the retail version. The original offerings were either spaces taken from the campaign or Forge World creations and remakes of older maps. Even the Noble Map Pack, released by Bungie on November 30, didn’t measure up to the maps of the previous Halo games, though they were better than the base offerings.

Interestingly, Halo: Reach’s second map pack, the Defiant Map Pack, was crafted by Certain Affinity, who made the Blastacular Map Pack for Halo 2. The Defiant Map Pack includes two new multiplayer spaces and a Firefight arena, but what makes this particular DLC worth your hard earned space bucks?
Continue reading Halo: Reach’s Defiant Map Pack: DLC Worth Paying For

The GamerSushi Show, Ep 23: The Land Down Over/Under

And we’re back, fellow gamers. It’s been a couple of weeks because a certain bearded somebody forgot that Thursdays are our podcast nights, and decided to go out and have a life instead. However, everything is back to normal, and now a brand new podcast is out for your enjoyment.

In this episode of our gaming ramblings, we chat about a few new games in more detail, such as Dragon Age 2 and Crysis 2. We also tackle an awesome game of Over/Under, in which Nick has us guess on Metacritic scores for upcoming games. It’s seriously one of my favorite games we play, and I think the results in this one are pretty awesome.

So, here are the topics for this week’s podcast. Thanks to Nick’s efforts, we thought we’d try something different and list the time stamps for each thing in the podcast. Hopefully that’ll make it easier if there are certain topics you want to hear about.

Listen. Rate. ♥. Continue reading The GamerSushi Show, Ep 23: The Land Down Over/Under

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Things Get Hot With Battlefield 3 Fault Line Episode 3

Like clockwork, I bring you another episode of the Fault Line series of trailers for Battlefield 3. Last time, the squad was tasked with bringing down a sniper hiding in a building; this time, we see a little bomb disarming, some first-person fighting and a last stand against overwhelming forces.

These trailers are definitely starting to pick up, and I can’t wait to see what surprises are in store for us when the last video hits in April. What do you guys think? Is Battlefield 3 still looking hot? What’s your opinion on the addition of first-person melee combat?

Review: Crysis 2

Ah, Crysis, the most mythical of beasts in the PC herd. Running Crysis on maximum setting was kind of like spotting a unicorn. We all knew a guy who said he had done it once, but deep down we knew he was lying.

Don’t get me wrong, I played Crysis (on low) and I loved it. Sneaking around a huge jungle island, fighting Koreans and aliens and taking to the Battlefield inspired multiplayer arenas held a lot of fun. Unfortunately, Crysis had a really high barrier for entry and it wasn’t widely played during its time; even when Crytek tried to optimize the engine for the Crysis Warhead and Crysis Wars, the game still chugged processing power like no tomorrow.

Now Crytek is back with a new engine and they have consoles in their sights. Does Crysis 2 succeed in being the best of both worlds, or has Crytek traded their PC cred for the console market?
Continue reading Review: Crysis 2