Category: PC

Become Filthy Fuel Vultures in Left 4 Dead 2


We’ve got some good news coming out of the Left 4 Dead 2 front this week as it creeps inexorably closer to its November release date. With the demo coming up for pre-order customers (of which I am one), Valve has dropped information for another competitive mode called “Scavenge”.

In this new mode, the four survivors band together in an effort to gather fuel cans from around the level while the Special Infected try to choke, burn, and other-wise decimate the poor would-be escapees. Adding to the complication of having a whole passel of crazy zombies on your tail is the fact that the gas cans in Left 4 Dead are extremely fragile, and can easily be set off by either the Spitter’s acid or an errant bullet. “Scavenge” matches consists of three round at 120 seconds each, with each fuel can be collected by the Survivors adding twenty precious seconds to the clock. The Survivors need to find 16 cans spread across the level in order to win. The levels themselves are arena-like updates of sections from the existing campaign maps.

Now, this strikes me as an excellent idea. I used to play a Source mod called Zombie Master which had a similar mechanic to it, where the humans would collect various item from the level in order to rebuild an escape vehicle while the Zombie Master commanded his hordes in a bid to stop them. Granted, the role of Zombie Master was more of an RTS-type control scheme, but I think Left 4 Dead 2 can pull it off admirably.

So, what do you fellas think of this new mode? Does it strike your fancy, or are you going to stick to campaign and versus? Also, who else has pre-ordered this and for what system?

Source: Destructoid

UK Police Enlist Gamers to Catch Crooks, Form Combine

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Now here’s something you don’t see every day. Apparently, the British Police are developing a video game in which ordinary citizens can look through the lenses of actual CCTV cameras and try to catch a crime in progress. If they do see some shifty stuff going down, they just have to click their mouse and the operator on the receiving end is sent a text message including a picture of the alleged dirty deed.

Called Internet Eyes (Eagle Eye was taken), this web-based initiative will launch next month in a town called Stratford-upon-Avon. The site for the game has a “Hall of Fame” for the caught criminals, and will offer £1,000 to the most successful sleuth.

This raises all sorts of questions about, first off all, how the Police determines that something is actually a crime, and not just someone who locked their keys in their car. This system is open to abuse that way, where a griefer (and you know there will be griefers), will spam the site with a whole bunch of pictures of nothing. While I’m sure there are contingency plans in place to deal with potential problems, this might backfire in a pretty spectacular way.

I still think it’s a neat idea, just not one without its possible pitfalls. But, what do you guys think? Is this a brilliant scheme by the British Police, or does this cross a line? Can you see something like this spreading around the globe?

Source: Destructoid

Modern Warfare 2: Infamy Trailer

There is no question that Modern Warfare 2 is the most anticipated title of the year, with a hype level that has been snowballing as of late. As if that wasn’t enough, the folks over at Infinity Ward have released a brand new trailer for the game, moving me from excited to a near fever pitch. One of the wildest parts of the trailer? Images of what looks to be Washington, DC under attack. Why isn’t it November yet?

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 Drops the F-Bomb

We’re getting closer to 2010, which mean that we’re starting to see some new media from a lot of next year’s big titles. Mass Effect 2 and Splinter Cell have been conducting the information blitz, but one game I’ve kept my eyes peeled for especially is Battlefield: Bad Company 2, seemingly the millionth game this quarter to bear the number “2” in it’s title.

The original Bad Company’s multi-player was surprisingly robust, owing in part to the amazing environmental destruction mechanics. With a year and a bit of refinement behind it, Bad Company 2 is well positioned to deliver the same crazy shoot-outs, even if it looks like it’s been bitten by the Call of Duty bug. Check out the trailer, which contains a surprisingly large number of epithets, so exercise discretion if you’re around those with sensitive ears.

The game also looks really polished graphically, so consider me psyched for this! Is anyone else looking forward to some more Bad Company, and what systems are you getting it for?

All Points Bulletin Trailer Hits the Streets

Have you been wondering what Crackdown developer Realtime Worlds has been doing since 2007 when their game launched? Well, wonder no more as you absorb the awesome trailer for All Points Bulletin (APB), a free-to-play MMO. It looks a lot like GTA IV multi-player, and as long as they can get it to be a lot more stable than that I think we’ve got a hit on our hands.

In APB, you can join one of two sides, the Enforcers or the Criminals. Once you’ve chosen your side, you can fully customize your own gang and roam around the city with friends hitting fools with you car. The shooting looks pretty tight as well, and I’m very intrigued by the option to recreate the look of the Beastie Boys out of their “Sabotage” video and rip around the streets.

APB is set to debut on both the PC and the 360 in March 2010. Given that Crackdown was a huge sleeper hit, I think that there’s going to be a large player base when this game comes out. Who’s going to be giving APB a try, and on what platform?

GamerSushi Reviews: Quick Hits

quick-hitsWe play lots of games here around GamerSushi. So many, in fact, that there’s not possibly time to write reviews for all of them. While we would love to give some in-depth analysis of every title that graces our screens, we just don’t always get a chance to.

So, rather than neglect this bunch of titles, and make way for the deluge of blockbuster games that are about to appear on the queue, Mitch, Anthony and I decided to give you guys a new feature called Quick Hits.

What are Quick Hits? Quick Hits are fast and to-the-point reviews of several titles we’ve played recently, machine gunner style. Feel free to discuss the games at article’s end, and let us know what you think of them.
Continue reading GamerSushi Reviews: Quick Hits

Assassin’s Creed II and the Developer Dialogue

Assassin's CreedIt’s often gratifying as a gamer to hear that developers do listen to the complaints we have against their games. As small as we can sometimes feel against the pull of design committees, release dates and budget crunches, having a developer say that he’s heard our opinions and is taking them into serious consideration feels like a victory well deserved.

One of the games that has come out in the past couple of years that has seen the most amount of griping by the community at large is Assassin’s Creed. While the game found almost universal acceptance among its players, there were still a few points of contention which people felt needed to be addressed for the inevitable sequel. Things like the repetitive nature of the side missions and the over-all sameness of the actual assassinations were among the biggest criticisms raised against the game.

This is where the conversation with the game’s developer springs up. It’s not as literal as sitting down at a table with the design staff and reading off a list of grievances and what you would have done differently, but it can sometimes have the same effect. The best part is that when developers listen and change things, they’ll sometimes try to get us to differ our views by making us take a harder look at the tropes we’ve come to expect from games.

Continue reading Assassin’s Creed II and the Developer Dialogue

Meet the Team: Borderlands

If there’s one game coming out this holiday that has style leaking out of its cel-shaded ears, it’s Borderlands. In this new trailer for the upcoming FPS-RPG, we’re introduced to the various characters that we’ll be controlling as we explore the wasteland looking for sweet guns. There’s plenty of gory game-play (censored to tantalize you) and awesome music packed into this video, so check it out.

Gearbox’s CEO Randy Pitchford, notable for being slightly outspoken about his games, has said that he thinks Borderlands has the moxie to stand up to the big dogs this Christmas, and based on this trailer, he might be right. We’ve looked at this game before at GamerSushi, but I just couldn’t pass up sharing this trailer with you guys. I’m picking this up on PC for sure.

Just Cause 2 and Vertical Gameplay

One of the best demos I’ve ever played for a game was the one for Just Cause. While the game itself ended up being a bit repetitive, the demo showcased just enough to really make you want more. To me, the free-falling/parachuting mechanic was some of the most fun “flying” gameplay I had experienced since the wing cap in Mario 64. An open world game that allowed you to leap from car to car, or even jump up into helicopters, Just Cause made you a ridiculous action star, and had some promise, which is why I’m excited about the sequel.

The new edition to the franchise drops in 2010, and so far, it’s shaping up to be a hell of a ride. This vertical gameplay trailer really showcases some of the things you can do, and the thought of hook-shotting my way up skyscrapers and then leaping off of them gets my do want meter going. What do you guys think? Who here played the first game?

GamerSushi Taste Test: Tropico 3 Demo

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With the glut of shooters, brawlers, and generally anything being associated with action set for release this holiday season, it’s sometimes easy to let a game that doesn’t focus primarily on racking up a huge body count escape your notice. However, amidst all the big tent-pole titles, there’s usually a few that deserve at least some of your time, if only to cleanse the pallet from all the shootery-goodness.

Enter Tropico 3. Developed by Haemimont Games for the PC and X-Box 360, Tropico 3 is a building and management simulation that puts you in the boots of “El Presidente”, iron-fisted dictator of a small banana republic in the Caribbean. The time period is the 1950s and onward, so you have to play the US and the USSR carefully against each other, managing all your resources wisely if you don’t want to be invaded by one of the super-powers.

In the demo, you’re given a tutorial and two separate campaigns to play around in: one focusing on building a successful banana-fuelled dictatorship, and the other features a scenario where you’re deposed by your twin brother, taking your former government’s treasury and a few loyal supports onto a new, less hospitable island to start anew.

So, how does the demo stack up? Does this tropical city management sim have what it takes to stand against the deluge of holiday titles, or is it a few bananas short of a republic? Read on.
Continue reading GamerSushi Taste Test: Tropico 3 Demo

Mass Effect 2 Demo From PAX

Man, this seems like it was the year to go to PAX in Seattle. If you didn’t know, the huge gaming convention happened last weekend. I went last year, but was unable to attend this year, and I had to avoid the news because it was just going to make me depressed, hungry and angry. Yes, all three of those.

One of the big games that I wish I could have seen in person was Mass Effect 2. Bioware was rocking a nice demo from the game, and you can watch it in all its glory. Who else is getting ridiculously anxious for this game, due early next year? Just me? Ok then.

L4D2 Boycotters Given the Star Treatment

valveAh, the Left 4 Dead 2 boycott. One of the sillier boycotts around. Even though the footage from the new game is continuing to look better and better, and news of DLC for the first game is still pumping out, yes, the boycott for the sequel continues. While the official Steam group is content on making noise, Valve so far has done very little in terms of an official response, until now.

Apparently, the video game developer flew out the leaders of the boycott to get some hands-on time with Left 4 Dead 2, and even to see some of the behind-the-scenes info regarding the new DLC. I have to say, that’s about as good of a response as a boycotting group can hope to get, so major props to go those guys.

The funniest thing to me about the whole deal is the comments and accusations from fellow boycotters, accusing the leaders of selling out by going to Valve. Isn’t this the kind of thing you want to see from the developer? Anywho, I know we’ve talked about it before, but what do you guys think of Valve flying out these dudes to check out Left 4 Dead 2?

Source- L4D2 Boycott Steam Group

GamerSushi Asks: Where’s the Value?

batman1I’ve had one hell of a couple of weeks. I’ve been busy, tired, and working like crazy on a number of things. But in the middle of it all, I managed to get in a playthrough of Batman: Arkham Asylum, and boy was it worth it. As a few of you know, especially those that read Mitch’s review, the game is a blast, has an excellent story and some quality stealth gameplay. But something about it bothered me: its length.

While I think the game is maybe one of the best of this year, it is just simply too short for the money that people are expected to pay for it. To me, the game is totally worth $30-$40 simply because of its quality, but $60 is just asking too much for a game that only takes about 8 hours or so to beat. Sure, there is replay value in the challenges and Riddler puzzles, but does anyone else see this as an issue in terms of rising game costs?

To me, this is exactly why people tend to gravitate towards sequels and multiplayer games- the $60 price point is just too much for an impulse buy, or for a game that will only take one weekend to finish. So, what do you guys think about this issue? Go!

Awesome Mod Brings Call of Duty to Star Wars

If there’s two things I love, it’s Star Wars and shooting people in the face. Thankfully, a nice group of modders calling themselves blackMonkeys shares my love of sci-fi warfare and are hard at work on a total conversion kit for Call of Duty 4 called “Galactic Warfare”, which takes the silky smooth game-play of CoD and fits it in with classic Star Wars imagery.

The trailer for the mod showcases Stormtroopers and Rebel fighters battling it out in Mos Eisely, and it looks like everything that I hoped Battlefront II would be. With the future of the Battlefront series in limbo, I’m looking forward to trying this out when the mod is complete. Check out the video:

Microsoft Charging for New Left 4 Dead Content

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Poor Valve, they just can’t seem to catch a break. Hot on the heels of the Left 4 Dead 2 boycott debacle and the newly brewing Team Fortress 2 item-deletion snafu comes the news that the new Left 4 Dead campaign, Crash Course, is going to be free for PC users, but will cost 560 Microsoft Banana Bucks for 360 users.

Is Valve heading for another ill-deserved boycott? Maybe not, says Left 4 Dead writer Chet Faliszek. According to Chet, the decision to charge for the X-Box 360 mission lies solely with Microsoft. As Mr. Faliszek tells it, Steam is Valve’s distribution platform, so they can charge whatever they want, even give stuff away for free. Microsoft of course owns LIVE, so pricing for downloadable content there is a whole different ball game.
Continue reading Microsoft Charging for New Left 4 Dead Content

Modern Warfare 2 Continues to Look Hot

Infinity Ward has released another Modern Warfare 2 multi-player footage video, and I can’t believe how amazing this game looks. The user interface has been completely changed, and the new blood splatter effect that replaces the traditional pulsing red screen when you’re wounded is pretty slick. The guns also look a lot more detailed, and the player models have gotten a complete over-haul. With a good engine in place from CoD 4, it looks like Infinity Ward went a little wild, and we all get to reap the benefits.

Just like the last multiplayer video IW released, this preview is chock-a-block full of little hidden clues as to what you can expect when the game launches November 10th. Keep your eyes peeled after the video “ends” for a nice little surprise.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4PMRFkx07g[/youtube]

Here’s something I’m wondering, though. With Modern Warfare being released on three platforms (360, PC and PS3), will it outperform Halo 3:ODST on sales, or will the power of Halo continue to shine through?

Review: Batman: Arkham Asylum

batman arkham asylum reviewWhy are super-hero games so hard to get right? You’ve got tailor made settings, abilities and bad guys that you can just lift straight off the funny pages. Seems like an easy sell, right? Well, if you’ve been paying attention to the number of below-average super-hero games this generation, this task seems like a trickier prospect to pull off than at first glance.

The problem with most super-heroes is that they’re just that: super. When you think about it, every comic book character is practically invincible. Superman only has kryptonite to fear, and Spider-Man has his astonishing reflexes to fall back on. Only one comic book crusader has the right amount of limitations to make a challenging video game: Batman.

He’s almost perfect for a developer to take a hold of. No super-strength, no bullet-proof skin. He’s only got his wits, his body, and a handy assortment of gadgets. Many studios have tried to make the lightning strike with Batman, and now it’s Rocksteady’s turn to put the Dark Knight through his paces.
Continue reading Review: Batman: Arkham Asylum

GamerSushi Asks: What Are You Playing?

batman-lolIt’s time for our monthly “what are you playing” quiz, so you all know what that means.

Right now, I’ve been working my way through a couple of games: Batman: Arkham Asylum and Shadow Complex. The interesting thing about those is not only are they two of the better games I’ve played all year, they are actually very similar in style. I know there was a big discussion about the cliche term “Metroid-vania” (or Castleroid if you’re feeling saucy), and these two titles definitely fit the bill.

They both function in the same way, letting you explore a large complex, gaining access to it more over time as you learn new abilities or find new weaponry. It’s actually very interesting to see the juxtaposition between them, as one is 3D and one 2D, and both equally as enjoyable.

So, have either of you guys gotten try these out yet? And what are you playing as of this weekend?

Sneak Peak: Modern Warfare 2 Gameplay

Christmas has come early for you Modern Warfare fans, as some considerate soul has put up a minute and a half of juicy single-player footage. It’s off-screen, unfortunately, and the music is placeholder, (it’s actually the track Scorponok from the Transformers film), but it’s a good indication of the changes from Call of Duty 4. Take a look:

StarCraft 2 Map Editor Can Raise the Dead

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Well, this is a fine how-do-you-do. Looks like Blizzard’s plan to charge for custom maps is starting to make a bit more sense. This beast of a map editor was unveiled at BlizzCon, and is probably the most powerful editing tool ever released alongside a game.

Besides being able to make your vanilla strategy maps, the map editor demo given at the Starcraft 2 panel displayed its robust abilities by showing off an Action-RPG and a Galaga-type shooter. StarCraft: Ghost was even brought back to haunt the audience thanks to the fact that the main character’s model is included in the editor.

This is really exciting news in my opinion, but what do you guys think? Are you willing to pay money for some LittleBig StarCraft action, or do you think that maps made by the community should be doled out for free?

Source: Destructoid