Surprise and delight! Nikopol: Secrets of the Immortals masquerades in its box as a typical PC adventure game, but aren't you glad I'm here to tell you it's something more. Maybe it's the meticulously represented atmosphere of a future, politically dystopian Paris; maybe it's the story and art based on graphic novels by Enki Bilal; maybe it's the variety of puzzles that alternately lift your spirits with confidence and crush you back into frustration. Probably, though, it's the way that even when the going gets rough all of these elements combine to make a game that compels you to keep playing.
Enki Bilal's original Nikopol Trilogy contains The Carnival of Immortals, The Woman Trap, and Equator Cold, but the game sort of takes an alternate slice of the first. You play as Alcide Nikopol, son of the Alcide Nikopol whom most of the major events swirl around. To be honest, you'll get a lot more out of the game if you have read the comics (or maybe seen the 2004 film version, although that is also pretty different and takes a more Hollywood-feeling approach to part of the story). That said, the game is good enough to make you feel like searching out the graphic novel, and reading it is worthwhile in its own right.
In any case, your dad (who is the same age as you, due to his being cryogenically hibernating while incarcerated for 30 years) is possessed by Horus, the Egyptian god. His former pals, the other gods, are parked in a giant pyramid spaceship over the city, trying to convince the dictator-prophet-governor of Paris to give them fuel. When that doesn't work, they decide to make a go of taking over the government, but Horus wants to foil them by having it himself, hence using your dad as host body. It's a big humans-as-pawns plot and Anubis continues the trend (in the game) by exhorting you (the son, remember) to catch up with Horus/Pop. The other half of the story's plot about your dad's relationship with Jill, the blue haired not-quite-human girl, is mostly ignored.
When the game starts (fresh from a visit to the panoramic main menu--only a taste of the fanciness to come) you're in Nikopol Jr.'s apartment. It's a perfect mess befitting an artist/student, and right from there I was impressed with the details. The textures look good, the colors are great, and there's just so much to see in these environments. Of course, the clutter can occasionally make it hard to make out just what is and is not useful to the resourceful protagonist, but the dynamic cursor helps, even if it does (pretty much without fail) reduce you to mousing over the whole screen like you're combing a beach.
I usually find timed events completely irksome and unwarranted, but for some reason in Nikopol they're exciting. After you putz around in your room for a while (painting a picture of your dad for the underground resistance group you just joined), a nasty creature comes for your arrest and if you screw around for too long, you're dead. Barricading the door isn't enough, and by the time I puzzled out the exact sequence of clicks I needed -- 13, if I counted correctly -- I figured that never in a million years would I complete them all in time. Perseverance found me progressing nicely, however, and I eventually made my way to area two, the former grocery store, now cemetery.
Besides evading capture, you'll break some codes, reroute some subway trains, and burn some aliens. Programming key cards with lit hexagon signs could almost be a puzzle game by itself. The only thing that bothered me was the occasional unclear objective. For instance, I stumbled upon an alarm box, but I didn't really know what the alarms were for or why I would need to shut them down. There just seemed to be a puzzle, but maybe puzzling out what the puzzle is for is just part of the... yeah, puzzle.
Thankfully, in addition to the dynamic cursor, which allows you to pick up, interact, or read with one button, the inventory system is super accessible and streamlined -- well, it has to be for those timed segments. Right clicking brings up a ring of items and you just left click to use something. Right clicking cancels, so you can easily click your way through all the items in case you have one of those "try everything once" moments.
Besides great graphics with nothing but a bit of fish-eye lens effect during mouse-look to distract from total immersion (unless you count the stylized cut-scenes working in the graphic novel ties), Nikopol features zero-complaint voice acting and some occasional tense music to keep your brain working. It feels like the most complete package I've gotten in an adventure game in quite some time, despite the fact that it's pretty short and should probably experienced as a companion to the comic.
Closing Comments Where many adventure games get discouraging when you're stuck, Nikopol: Secrets of the Immortals is one that feels like a challenge worth taking on. It's fun to look at, fun to play, and it's even fun to call someone you feel might be a bit smarter than you and drag them over to look at a tricky part. If it didn't rely quite so much on the context of The Carnival of Immortals, I'd call it a must-play for PC adventurers.
This is the year of previously free Flash games being enhanced and packaged for retail. N+ is already available, and now Line Rider 2: Unbound is making the rounds to the DS, Wii, and PC. The original Line Rider was really an interactive toy instead of a game. Players could freely draw slopes for their sledder to ride down, but there wasn't any structure or conflict. For the retail sequel, the developers have tried to strike a balance between freeform creation and a story mode that throws obstacles at the player. For the most part they succeed, but there are some interface issues that keep Line Rider 2 from being an entire success.
The game has been given context in the form of a Wile E. Coyote vs. Road Runner-type conflict between our hero, Bosh, and his all black-wearing rival. This rival fellow is always setting up traps for the player, but of course they end up backfiring on him. There is also a lady sledder the two seem to be battling over. The story is presented with animated cut scenes in between levels. They don't detract from the gameplay, but the premise is too clich�d to really enhance it.
Story Mode sends the player down carefully constructed levels with a start point, a goal, and several targets that need to be hit along the way. In between you and the finish line are gaps in the path that need to be filled in. Players draw lines in these specific areas in order to get Bosh to safety. Once he has come to a complete stop, Bosh will do an amusing little dance. Solving these puzzles will unlock artwork you can use when creating your own levels. There are four types of lines at your disposal: regular old lines, red speed lines, yellow slow down lines, and purple trap doors. Usually, levels can be solved in a number of ways and it's really fun going through the trial and error of figuring each one out. Editing is mostly a breeze thanks to an undo button, an eraser, a snap-to option, and a grab tool that lets you move either an entire line or adjust curve points.
One frustrating aspect is that lines have two sides -- the black side you ride on and a blue side that can be passed through. This is to create layers of tracks and a sense of depth. The problem is that the player determines which side is on top by the direction they draw the line. Right to left will put the black side on top, and left to right will present the blue side. It's not very intuitive because you naturally draw in both directions depending on the situation. Too often you'll draw a line only to find Bosh dropping through it into the void. You can train yourself to remember, but it doesn't feel natural and the game doesn't explain the function.
Bizarrely, Line Rider 2 doesn't allow players to adjust their graphics settings. That means if your PC doesn't meet the game's minimum specs, like my work computer here, you'll have to shrink the window size in order to ride these lines. I had it running smoothly in full screen after installing on a more powerful computer, but, come on, this isn't Crysis. It's an enhanced version of a free Flash game. PC titles typically let the user adjust their settings since there is such a wide variety of hardware configurations. Playing in a smaller window is problematic because you can't draw past the edge of the screen, so longer lines need to be strung together and you can't get a real sense of the environment.
Throughout Line Rider 2 we encountered strange collision issues. Sometimes Bosh would pass right by a target but wouldn't connect; sometimes he would land on his head but wouldn't fall off his sled; sometimes he'll pass through a line he shouldn't. Line Rider is about physics so it is disappointing to see all this inconsistency with how Bosh interacts with the game world.
The levels are inventive and as you progress through Story Mode they get pretty epic. After all the time you spend on it, you may want to watch the run again and savor your victory. You can, but you can't save your replays, unfortunately. You can export videos of the levels you create in Freestyle mode, so I don't see why saved replays wouldn't be possible in Story mode.
Outside of Story Mode are the Freestyle and Puzzle modes where you can really get creative. Freestyle works like classic Line Rider, allowing players to create zany runs to send Bosh down. Only now you can add more graphics to your scenes. Puzzle mode allows you to create structured obstacles like the ones you find in the story and share them with others via the game's official website. There are even more lines available in these modes, like trampolines that Bosh will bounce on and scenery lines that are just for decoration and won't affect the sled. The editor is robust, and downloading user-created levels will greatly increase the game's lifespan.
The music in Line Rider 2 is one of its highlights. For the most part it is catchy, lighthearted electronica that will get stuck in your head.
Closing Comments Line Rider's core concept is great, and this sequel does pretty much what it sets out to do: monetize the free online toy with added gameplay, visuals, and music. The story mode puzzles are inventive and provide a real sense of satisfaction when you finally get everything right. Creative types will be able to do a lot with the editor, and all users can extend the life of the game by sharing new content locally and online. There are some interface problems and it's dumbfounding that you can't tweak your graphics settings. But the unique gameplay and downloadable content might make it worth it.
Crysis Warhead is the videogame equivalent of a summer action movie, and while it's more action-heavy than its highly acclaimed predecessor, it still retains its brains. Like Crysis, Warhead is a sandbox shooter that gives you large amounts of freedom as to how you approach each tactical situation. And there are plenty of tactical situations, because Warhead seems aimed at those who felt that Crysis was a bit too slow-paced and cerebral at times. But while it doesn't quite match the over-the-top insanity of a Call of Duty game, Warhead does prove that Crytek can deliver an intense action game.
Warhead is a companion game to Crysis, with a story that runs concurrently to that in the first game. An alien artifact has been discovered on a tropical island, and after the United States and North Korea race to seize it, an alien invasion erupts, flash freezing the island and putting the world at risk. The difference is in perspective; you now get to play as British Sergeant Michael Sykes, aka Psycho, the blowhard from the first game. Warhead takes place on "the other side of the island" that Crysis takes place on. If you played that game you already know the beginning and the end, so what matters here is the journey.
The opening cinematic establishes the kind of character Psycho is, and the kind of game Warhead will be. With aplomb, he leaps off of cliffs into moving trucks, manhandles North Koreans, and generally sneers at danger. Warhead is a much more cinematic game than its predecessor, partly due to third-person cutscenes (they were totally absent in Crysis), but also because it feels like Crytek openly borrowed a page or two from director Michael Bay. This goes right down to the overwrought emotional scenes to the driving musical score full of Japanese takio drums and soaring movements.
Like Crysis, the heart of Warhead is its combination of sandbox gameplay with the nanosuit, the high-tech body armor that can give you superhuman strength or speed, or cloak you from detection. Used correctly, the nanosuit lets you basically be the alien Predator from the movies, and the open nature of the levels means that you can dictate the terms of the battle. It's a blast to hurl grenades at long range at a squad of bad guys, then use speed to close the distance, strength to pick up a survivor and hurl him into his buddies, and then to finish them off with a few rounds of rifle fire. You can cloak and sneak right up to your opponents, or have them follow you only to cloak and then change direction. It's all up to you. Combine that ad lib style of gameplay with the generally smart AI, and each play through of Warhead can be completely different.
The emphasis is on large battles, whether you're assaulting a beach resort full of North Korean troops, barreling down a road in an APC and shooting up the villages you drive through, or defending a group of soldiers from alien assault. Crytek reduced the downtime between battles to a bare minimum; you're often no sooner out of a fight before stumbling into another one. And sometimes, you might even drag one fight into another. That happened quite a bit during the alien levels, when the aliens attacked me with numbers that forced me to engage in a running battle. I'd have one group chasing me only to stumble into another. And, yes, the alien battles in Warhead are a lot tougher than they are in Crysis. Gone are the short, linear sequences; now you're in the sandbox with the aliens, so it's a fast-paced cat-and-mouse game of shoot, move, and cover. The aliens dart around; they like to pelt you from a distance. There are also some new alien types, including a new shield alien that protects his buddies; you have to take him out first in a fight, which isn't easy.
You get some new toys; my favorite is the six-shot grenade launcher that provides some personal artillery, as well as a submachine gun and equipment like antitank mines. Still, for the most part, many of the weapons remain the same, though the lower difficulty levels now allow you to automatically pick up ammo by walking over it, which is more user friendly. And your most potent weapon remains your nanosuit; used smartly, you can survive just about any situation.
While shorter and slightly less epic than Crysis, Warhead still provides a fun ride. Crytek definitely learned some lessons and have applied them to Warhead. I also like how Crytek have a lot more fun with the frozen paradise that the island becomes once the aliens freeze it. There are definitely some memorable scenes, like when you're piloting a hovercraft and hitting jumps off of frozen waves. Or how the brittle, iced-over jungle shatters when the bullets fly in a firefight.
Crysis Warhead is the videogame equivalent of a summer action movie, and while it's more action-heavy than its highly acclaimed predecessor, it still retains its brains. Like Crysis, Warhead is a sandbox shooter that gives you large amounts of freedom as to how you approach each tactical situation. And there are plenty of tactical situations, because Warhead seems aimed at those who felt that Crysis was a bit too slow-paced and cerebral at times. But while it doesn't quite match the over-the-top insanity of a Call of Duty game, Warhead does prove that Crytek can deliver an intense action game.
Warhead is a companion game to Crysis, with a story that runs concurrently to that in the first game. An alien artifact has been discovered on a tropical island, and after the United States and North Korea race to seize it, an alien invasion erupts, flash freezing the island and putting the world at risk. The difference is in perspective; you now get to play as British Sergeant Michael Sykes, aka Psycho, the blowhard from the first game. Warhead takes place on "the other side of the island" that Crysis takes place on. If you played that game you already know the beginning and the end, so what matters here is the journey.
The opening cinematic establishes the kind of character Psycho is, and the kind of game Warhead will be. With aplomb, he leaps off of cliffs into moving trucks, manhandles North Koreans, and generally sneers at danger. Warhead is a much more cinematic game than its predecessor, partly due to third-person cutscenes (they were totally absent in Crysis), but also because it feels like Crytek openly borrowed a page or two from director Michael Bay. This goes right down to the overwrought emotional scenes to the driving musical score full of Japanese takio drums and soaring movements.
Like Crysis, the heart of Warhead is its combination of sandbox gameplay with the nanosuit, the high-tech body armor that can give you superhuman strength or speed, or cloak you from detection. Used correctly, the nanosuit lets you basically be the alien Predator from the movies, and the open nature of the levels means that you can dictate the terms of the battle. It's a blast to hurl grenades at long range at a squad of bad guys, then use speed to close the distance, strength to pick up a survivor and hurl him into his buddies, and then to finish them off with a few rounds of rifle fire. You can cloak and sneak right up to your opponents, or have them follow you only to cloak and then change direction. It's all up to you. Combine that ad lib style of gameplay with the generally smart AI, and each play through of Warhead can be completely different.
The emphasis is on large battles, whether you're assaulting a beach resort full of North Korean troops, barreling down a road in an APC and shooting up the villages you drive through, or defending a group of soldiers from alien assault. Crytek reduced the downtime between battles to a bare minimum; you're often no sooner out of a fight before stumbling into another one. And sometimes, you might even drag one fight into another. That happened quite a bit during the alien levels, when the aliens attacked me with numbers that forced me to engage in a running battle. I'd have one group chasing me only to stumble into another. And, yes, the alien battles in Warhead are a lot tougher than they are in Crysis. Gone are the short, linear sequences; now you're in the sandbox with the aliens, so it's a fast-paced cat-and-mouse game of shoot, move, and cover. The aliens dart around; they like to pelt you from a distance. There are also some new alien types, including a new shield alien that protects his buddies; you have to take him out first in a fight, which isn't easy.
You get some new toys; my favorite is the six-shot grenade launcher that provides some personal artillery, as well as a submachine gun and equipment like antitank mines. Still, for the most part, many of the weapons remain the same, though the lower difficulty levels now allow you to automatically pick up ammo by walking over it, which is more user friendly. And your most potent weapon remains your nanosuit; used smartly, you can survive just about any situation.
While shorter and slightly less epic than Crysis, Warhead still provides a fun ride. Crytek definitely learned some lessons and have applied them to Warhead. I also like how Crytek have a lot more fun with the frozen paradise that the island becomes once the aliens freeze it. There are definitely some memorable scenes, like when you're piloting a hovercraft and hitting jumps off of frozen waves. Or how the brittle, iced-over jungle shatters when the bullets fly in a firefight.
One day, I went 90 miles per hour in my car and crashed into a fence. The shift in momentum was so intense that my body flew through the car's front windshield. Eventually, my body smashed onto the pavement. Yet, that day I suffered no wounds. While this might sound like a miracle, or perhaps a plot element out of an M. Night Shyamalanfilm, I was simply playing Bugbear Entertainment's arcade racer, FlatOut: Ultimate Carnage. The PC version is a port of the Xbox 360 game which released in 2007. Has it made any improvements to become the ultimate racer or is it just flat out boring? The answer lies somewhere in between.
In many ways FlatOut: Ultimate Carnage is a lot like the Burnout racing games. It doesn't feature any traffic, but destruction is rewarded with either speed boosts or points. Although the game doesn't offer the same speed as Burnout 3 or F-Zero GX, it still holds its own. However, what good is speed if your car handles poorly? Thankfully, the cars handle pretty responsively in FlatOut, but you'll need a gamepad to properly take advantage of the controls. Even though the default keyboard controls are functional, the game was clearly designed for the Xbox 360 controller. Even the menus are mapped with Xbox 360 buttons.
Once you get your preferred control setup taken care of, you'll notice that cars maneuver pretty well. If however, you do find yourself crashing a lot, you won't have to call it quits because the physics engine is pretty forgiving. Hit a pole? You'll be okay. One area that could use some improvement is the track layout, which feels a little simplistic and shallow. The race tracks feel consistently narrow and the alternating routes are usually two-second unrewarding detours. However, my biggest gripe with the racing is the satisfaction of power sliding, or the lack thereof. Attempting to power slide won't yield rewarding benefits and will often lead to fishtails.
The most effective way to race is by wreaking havoc. Ramming into opponents will give you speed boosts, which you'll need because your opponents are pretty aggressive. As a matter of fact, this game offers a good challenge overall. The Beat the Bomb mode requires you to reach checkpoints before your car explodes. This is an interesting take on an old school racing concept, and it's friggin' hard! Not only is it tough to get good times in races, but it's hard to achieve the game's set goals in its non-racing missions as well.
Like the Burnout series, FlatOut offers missions that reward destruction and stunts with points. In the Carnage Races, you will be tossed into a checkpoint-style race, and your objective is to wreak as much havoc as possible to score points. A non-racing destructive mode is Deathmatch Derby, which pits you against a dozen or so drivers in a dangerous arena to either rank up points or be the last man standing. But Deathmatch Derby isn't the only non-racing alternative. A big portion of the game is the stunt jumps. Like famous stuntman, Evel Knievel, who used his motorcycle to jump over heaps of buses, you too will be traversing over obscene distances through the air.
Except that in FlatOut you, literally you and not your car, will do the flying. In the stunt mode, you'll drive your car a short distance and preload your jump with a launch button. The earlier you hold the button, the higher you'll fly. However, hold it down too long and your driver may shoot up instead of forward. As your driver goes airborne, you can slightly alter your landing trajectory by pressing down on the directional pads. If you come up slightly short handed, the game allows you to do a last resort body flop, which can be a lifesaver at times. You're going to be doing this a lot as there are twelve different stunt tracks, each offering its unique, silly twist to the mode.
Rather than simply jumping over buses, the stunts in FlatOut will have you doing zany things. One stunt will require you to launch your driver through an arch of fiery rings. Later, you'll become the bowling ball in an oversized bowling alley setup filled with gigantic pins. Then there's the track that has several gigantic basketball hoops, where you're the basketball. If you're feeling lucky, there's a "royal flush" card game that launches you into a humungous wall of cards. Each card represents a point value, and your job is to rank up the most points. While there's a ton of other modes: soccer, football, darts, etc… It all essentially boils down to your ability to properly preload a jump. The stunts are arguably the best thing about the game, and it's enhanced when you play with friends.
Luckily, FlatOut offers both online and offline multiplayer. Unfortunately, your offline multiplayer experience consists of alternating a single controller around the room. What adds to the disappointment is the fact that you can only play the stunt modes together. There's no split screen racing in this game. The online multiplayer isn't perfect either and requires gamers to have either a Games for Windows Live account. Once you get online, you'll get the chance to participate in all of the game's various modes: races, Deathmatch Derby, or stunts. My online experience was definitely playable, but the frame rate seemed too hitch a little more.
However, even offline, the frame rate was very inconsistent. A major issue that I ran into with my Steam copy of the game is that FlatOut does not run well on mid-to-lower-end machines. I tried the game on a GeForce 7800 GTX and an ATI X1900, but both ran at mediocre frame rates on medium settings. The game would also hitch on the high settings for my GeForce 8800 GTS. Perhaps this can be fixed with a future patch, but it's a shame that in its current state, my pretty decent gaming rig cannot run the game better than an Xbox 360.
If you do manage to get FlatOut running at a decent frame rate, you'll notice that it's not a bad looking game. There are some good environmental effects like dust, smoke, and fiery explosions. Things like wood pieces will break and your car will be able to run over them. Driving into these obstacles and other cars will take a visual toll on your vehicle. You'll eventually see dinks, bumps, and your hood might fly off. If you're able to run the game on high settings, you'll notice that the textures look pretty sharp. However, in addition to frame rate issues, the graphics engine also suffers from clipping. On more than one occasion, a barrel or pipe got stuck in my car.
Also somewhat of a mixed bag is the audio. While the sound effects sound natural for a racer, the music is a generic mix of hard rock. Although it isn't terrible, the track list is pretty short, so you'll hear the same songs on a pretty frequent rotation.
Closing Comments FlatOut: Ultimate Carnage tries to be part arcade racer and part simulator, and for the most part it works. The main problem is that it doesn't push boundaries in either direction. So if you're trying to get immersed in a realistic racing game, you're better off with Grid. If you enjoy silly stunts and racing at insane speeds then you should wait to see how Burnout Paradise PC turns out. Still, hybrid racers of this type are pretty rare on the PC in this day and age, and this is by no means a bad game. So if you're looking for a fun and silly racer that may not blow you away, FlatOut: Ultimate Carnage may be the racer for you. So go break a leg, or two.
Mercenaries 2: World in Flames is about blowing s*** up. If you don't like blowing s*** up, here's a deck of Uno cards. Now, if you're like me and you get a kick out of wrecking tanks, demolishing buildings, and setting the jungle ablaze, then Mercs 2 may be worthy of your attention. But be warned: there's a price to pay for the gift of tactical nukes and cruise missile strikes. For all the unadulterated joy of blowing s*** up, there's a mess of bugs and AI issues that may just turn you even more violent than usual.
At the start, you choose to play as one of three characters -- Mattias Nilsson, Jennifer Mui, or Chris Jacobs. Each has his or her own unique traits. Jen, for example, is a bit speedier than the boys. These slight differences from one to the next don't have a major impact on the game. Neither do they offer new gameplay choices, though there are a few minor dialogue alterations for each. Whomever you choose, the end result is a mercenary willing to kill anyone and destroy anything for the right amount of money.
The story is about as deep as a Schwarzenegger flick, with Mattias offering hilarious one-liners punctuated by his ridiculous accent. I can't wait until they cast him as the next Mr. Freeze. You agree to do a job for Ramon Solano -- an up-and-coming scumbag -- who shows his gratitude by shooting you in the ass. What's a merc to do? Get revenge, of course. And so you embark on a rather brief adventure to bring Solano down. The big surprise twist is that there is no surprise twist. That's the story and there are few story-driven cutscenes between the beginning and ending. You're going to lay waste to Venezuela, there's no time for plot.
Venezuela is in the midst of rebellion, with oil the central focus of the conflict. The Venezuelan army is doing its best to maintain control of the country, but there are a number of factions looking to take control. You'll work with five different factions -- Universal Petroleum, the People's Liberation Army of Venezuela, the Chinese army, the Allied Nations (aka the US), and the Rastafarian Pirates. Each faction has its own set of missions and each, in some way, will get you closer to Solano. Of course, none of these guys get along and often a mission in support of one faction involves doing harm to another.
There is a very simplistic dynamic between your merc and the factions. Kill a faction's enemies and complete missions for them and they start to like you. You'll be allowed to land at their outposts and buy air support. Kill members of a faction or generally do them harm and they will start to dislike you very quickly. They'll begin shooting you on sight and will close their shop doors to you. These relationships can be swayed very easily, so it's never much of a burden. But, at the same time, it never feels as if you are really playing one side against another. You're just completing missions until one side is all dried up, then moving on to the next.
All these different factions means you will be running into a whole lot of different NPCs. Pandemic squanders a great opportunity to immerse gamers with unique and well-crafted dialogue. The dialogue for NPCs is absolutely abysmal and is handled about as poorly as I have seen in a videogame. "It's the merc!" a PLAV soldier cries out as you approach. He says this either as a cheer because you are on his side or because you are an enemy he wants to shoot. It's the same line, delivered again and again often out of context. And there are many lines shouted incorrectly. And all of them are repeated ad nauseam.
Want to explore? Get ready for your home base to call in and remind you to come visit them if you are ever stuck -- three or four times. I've heard this same line about 200 times. No exaggeration. The three mercs deliver their repetitive one-liners well, but that can't make up for shoddy implementation of NPC dialogue.
The good news is that you always have recourse when an enemy's voice starts to get on your nerves. Blow him back to god. You are going to kill a hell of a lot of people and destroy a whole heck of a lot of Venezuela before all is said and done. Combat is straightforward. You shoot and kill people. There are tons of vehicles, from civilian hoopdies to motorcycles to numerous tanks to boats to Sea-Doos to attack choppers. And all of them can be hijacked.
Some of the more potent vehicles, such as tanks and choppers, have hijacking minigames. In these you must hit the correct keys as they appear on screen to play out a swank cinematic of your jack. And yes, you can steal helicopters. As long as one is relatively close, aim towards it and hit the correct key to grapple. There are an impressive variety of tanks and choppers and each has its own hijacking button sequence.
While rolling through town and creating new potholes is fun (especially since most damage remains until you quit your play session), the best part of Mercs 2 is calling in air support. You can call for weapon and vehicle drops, which are handy, but the most effective tool is calling in an air strike. Air strikes are either purchased from a faction or found lying around Venezuela. All air support costs fuel, but don't worry, there's plenty of fuel to steal across the country and it rarely becomes an issue after the first two hours of gameplay.
Air strikes can be a pain at times to execute, since you must stop moving to open the side menu, select the strike and then direct the call-in. All the while, you'll probably be getting shot up. It's a good thing that health auto-regenerates. You'll call in bombing runs, artillery strikes, and, yes, even nuclear bombs. There are many different strikes to play around with, but just about all of them deliver a powerful (and some would say beautiful) explosion and impressive destruction. Everything but the rocks can be destroyed. Every building, vehicle and structure. And though there are some moments where the framerate suffers, these are not common. Amazingly, all the destruction is handled very well by developer Pandemic's engine.
I can't stress enough just how much fun it is playing in this destructive sandbox. And that fun is really Mercenaries' saving grace, because there are so many other things that are handled poorly. Were it not for the great joy of blowing s*** up, Mercs 2 would sour quickly.
There are bugs aplenty in Mercs 2. I even hit a critical bug in the last mission that crapped on the final showdown with Solano. But more than bugs, there are some really questionable design choices. You can take a tank and run over 10 vehicles, having them explode each time and take no damage. But run over a fire hydrant and your tank takes damage. Huh? Fall damage for your hero is also out of whack. The Chinese HQ is set in a temple atop a steep set of stairs. Run down those stairs and you will actually fall a few feet and take nine points of damage. The same thing happens on hillsides. If you run, you will actually lose your footing at times, drop a few feet and get hurt. And yes, this can kill if you're in the middle of a firefight.
The strangest choice of all was turning your merc into superman. Single melee kills are an easy thing to abuse in a game like this. In fact, I found shooting enemies to be a bit pointless after a while, since I could run straight at them and bash their face in. There are dozens of High Value Targets you have the option to hunt down. The intention seems to be that you would bust into an enemy camp, get into a firefight, make your way to the HVT and try and subdue him. In truth, you can drive a car right up to the HVT, hop out, punch a few people to death and take the target. Many missions are just way too easy if you use your fists.
This is in part due to some generally poor AI. I've encountered a fair share of soldiers standing in corners staring at the wall like they were in the Blair Witch Project. The AI typically points forward and shoots. And if you approach a vehicle, they often get out so you can take it. Uh, thanks? At its best, the enemy AI will try and hop into a vehicle you've abandoned, making it risky to land an attack chopper and leave it unguarded.
The enemy AI is bad, but your allies' AI is worse. It's often impossible to get allies to come into your vehicles, though it's obvious they are supposed to join if you honk your horn. And when trying to have allies enter an outpost to claim it, they will sometimes stand around doing nothing or will get into vehicles for no reason.
Okay, so lots of issues and yet, I still think this is a game worth playing. This is partly because of the addition of online two-player co-op. The game is set in the host player's world and all missions benefit him. The other player earns cash and lovely prizes to bring back to his own game, but won't get to progress their game any further. But they do get to have a witness when they blow s*** up.
Mercs 2 doesn't scale, making some of the tougher missions much easier to tackle with a friend. In fact, Mercenaries 2 seems balanced for two players more so than one. Especially since, in co-op, your teammate can revive you if you die. They just have to get near you, hit the proper button, and you're back on your feet. In single-player, death kills you, so to speak. It helps to communicate, as one man's explosion can often be his friend's untimely demise. With two people calling in air strikes, these can get pretty crazy on screen. There's something eerily poetic about laying a hail of bullets on an enemy as your face is awash in the glow of a nuclear detonation. Co-op is a powder keg of goodness. There is some occasional slowdown when there are big explosions and I hit a few moments of lag in each of my sessions. Overall, it's a good, if not perfect, experience.
Closing Comments Mercenaries 2 is like a newsstand; it has a lot of issues. Still, I can't deny that there were some hootin’ and hollerin’ moments. For every time I cursed the stupid AI, I cheered at the demolition of another building. For every bug that got me stuck in some bushes, there was an attack chopper waiting to be jacked. If Mercenaries 2 had more polish, it would have been a great game. As is, it’s still worth playing –- and enjoyable –- but falls far short of its promise.
With eight expansion packs, Electronic Arts certainly hasn't left fans of its Sims 2 series without content. The latest, Apartment Life, comes out in the twilight of The Sims 2's lifespan, as The Sims 3 is getting ready for release in February 2009. It's not that people won't play The Sims 2 after the third title's release, but it's reasonable to assume a large portion of the Sims fanbase will migrate over the newer, shinier product.
It's also worth mentioning that after so many expansions featuring so much content, Apartment Life, regardless of how good it is, isn't going to win over any new fans. It shouldn't be surprising to say that if you didn't like The Sims 2 before, this content isn't going to win you over. That being said, Apartment Life is very much a worthy addition to the sprawling realm of The Sims 2, and one longtime fans will likely enjoy and have probably already purchased at this point.
As you may or may not have inferred form the expansion's title, this one features apartments. Your Sims can now inhabit multi-unit rental properties, with multiple families per structure, pay rent every Monday, find roommates, and mingle with others in the neighborhood. So as soon as you pick a complex to move into, you can wander around and knock on neighbors' doors, introduce yourself and start to build up social networks. A newly added reputation meter helps govern how well you're received by the community. Assuming you're not the type of player that enjoys sending Sims into furious fits, it should make things easier for you.
With this expansion your Sims sacrifice some of their privacy, as your landlord will poke his or her head into the place to make sure everything's in order, and pop up to remind you about rent payments. Since you're renting, don't expect to be able to redecorate every bit of a spot you move into. While you can't adjust every aspect of your borrowed residence, you can decorate and view ceiling tiles, paint the walls, and plant shrubs. And of course there are a selection of new objects to place, including spiral staircases.
A roommate, a Sim you can't actually control, can be brought in to help out with payments, though you'll also be bringing whatever personality quirks they may have. So this feature adds a nice bit of unpredictability, as depending on who you've accepted or recruited, you could wind up with food left out on the floor or a pile of old newspapers.
Along with the social and housing additions is a fantastical element, something longtime players should be more than accustomed to with past additions of things like vampirism in the Nightlife expansion. This time you get Witchcraft with Apartment Life, an arcane art that can be practiced in varying shades of evil to good. It'll even allow you to, with the proper reagents, cast spells that summon lighting and insects. As a bonus, you'll also be able to ride brooms to community lots or castles in the magical world. Of course it's odd to be hanging around and have a dark witch suddenly swoop in outside a coffee shop, but that's how it is in the world of the Sims.
Closing Comments It's odd recommending an expansion pack like this with The Sims 3 coming out early next year. Yet if you're looking for more content to tide you over until the next game, Apartment Life certainly works as a solid expansion. It doesn't completely reinvent the style of gameplay you're used to, but it does make enough interesting tweaks and additions to warrant a look. And if this does turn out to be the last bit of official content released, it's not a bad way to go out for such a venerable franchise.
There's a strong case to be made that Maxis excels at making software toys rather than games. And there's a not so insignificant difference there, because a toy is something that you tinker with, whereas a game is something with a narrative, goals, or a way to win. That may be why Maxis titles have so much appeal. SimCity lets you indulge your inner mayor. Meanwhile, The Sims is the ultimate virtual dollhouse, letting you create your dream house and, by extension, your dream family. But now we come to Spore, the most ambitious Maxis product to date, and one that's as much as a game as it is a toy. Sure, you can tinker with Spore, but there's also a game here, one that involves the long struggle of life as it evolves and advances from a tiny cellular organism to intergalactic space travel. In fact, Spore is essentially five distinct games woven together. And here, Maxis demonstrates a weakness, as a number of these games come off as lightweight or limited. However, Spore is a prime example of something that is much more than the sum of its many parts.
I like to think of Spore as astrobiology in a box. Astrobiology is the field of science dedicated to thinking about what life on other planets might look like. To do that, it has to draw upon a wide range of scientific fields. Astronomy helps ascertain what sort of galactic conditions are needed to find a planet that will support life. Chemistry helps figure out where that life might have come from, while biology helps explain how it might evolve. Even societal studies, such as civics, might explain how advanced life might organize. Like classic Maxis games such as SimCity and SimEarth, Spore tackles complex subjects and makes them relatable to the player in an engaging way. Basically, Will Wright is the science teacher you wish you had in school.
The easiest way to look at Spore is take it apart stage by stage. So we kick off with the Cell Stage. Spore begins with a comet crashing to a planet's surface, seeding it with bacteria that evolve to become tiny cellular organisms, and you are one of them. This is an old fashioned, top-down arcade game, but one with bright, eye-catching graphics. You swim about the primordial oceans, eating as a carnivore, herbivore, or ominvore. Eating gives you DNA points that you can use to evolve your creature in the cell editor. There are also six different "parts" that you can discover, and these parts can give you different abilities. Water jets let you squirt faster through the water, fins let you maneuver better, spikes give you armor against predators, and so on.
There's something to be said about life in the ooze; it's easy, you swim around trying to eat but not be eaten. It's saying something of the game's design that even these tiny creatures are capable of conveying so much expression, particularly in their eyes. You see them panic and flee when chased, or a slight gleam when they see something they want to eat. Even the little chirps and noises they utter are grin inducing. Alas, all good things must come to an end, because as you eat and evolve, your creature becomes larger and larger until you finally fill up the evolution meter at the bottom of the screen, meaning that you're ready to sprout legs and move on to the next stage of Spore. Unfortunately, I found myself wanting to stay a bit longer in the ooze to evolve even further. There are bigger, meaner creatures to be found, and it'd be great if you could evolve to take them down.
Let's detour to Spore's user-created content for a moment. When you encounter another creature, vehicle, or building in spore, click on it and it's added to the built-in Sporepedia catalog. The Sporepedia is an incredible resource, since it keeps track of not only the content that you encounter in your current game, but it lets you access an entire universe of content created by Maxis and Spore players from around the world. Just witness the wild success of the Spore Creature Creator, one of the editors in the game that was released separately earlier this year. By molding and flexing the many different parts, users from around the world created more than three million creatures with an astonishing amount of variety. And it's very impressive how well it works. No matter how bizarre the creature, you still get a sense of emotions from them, from sad, to happy, to scared, to angry. They animate properly, and they move like you imagine they should. It's just an incredible technical accomplishment.
Consider that Spore features more than a dozen editors that let you create buildings, land vehicles, naval vessels, aircraft, and spacecraft. If you love creating things, then Spore is going to provide an incredible amount of joy. I, on the other hand, suck at making things. While I had fun creating my mosquito-like humanoid creatures, I lack the patience and the skill to really go wild. Some users can take the creature editor and make Viking longboats with oars. I'm nowhere near that good, so I accessed the built-in Sporepedia to select buildings and vehicles others made that I liked. Since you can access the Sporepedia at any moment in the game, it's easy to do. I could then tweak their color patterns and import them into my game. And, for the most part, I had the pick of mainly Maxis-made content since we'll need weeks and months for Spore users create millions of pieces of content.
Now onto Creature Stage, which is the "action" stage of Spore. You're now on land but you're still evolving. However, you're also learning how to interact with your own species and others. These interactions can either be friendly or hostile, and they generally consist of doing a social minigame or getting in a fight. However, you end repeating the same social interaction or attacks dozens of times, and it's a very simple system so it feels a bit like a chore after a while. And you have to do it, because allying with or exterminating other creatures gives you points that you can use toward evolving, as well as valuable parts that you can evolve your creature with.
The Tribal Stage plays out like a real-time strategy game, albeit a basic one. There's only one resource that your tribe members gather (food), and that's used to support a larger population as well as construct buildings that offer various upgrades. Like in Creature Stage, there are only two options: be nice with neighboring tribes and ally with them or crush them. To be nice, you have to serenade them; this time by playing one of four instruments when the tribal members request it. The war route means outfitting your tribe with weapons like stone axes that let you take down the opposition easier. Each tribe you eliminate adds a totem head to the totem poll; once there are five heads on the poll, you've done enough to advance to Civilization Stage. There's not a lot of challenge here for an experienced RTS gamer, and it doesn't take long to get through it at all. It doesn't help that this stage doesn't allow you to create anything in an editor, though you can outfit your creatures with accessories that can boost their social or combat abilities.
Next is Civilization Stage, which feels a bit like a scaled-up version of the Tribal Stage. This time you're struggling for domination of an entire planet, and the key is to capture cities through force, conversion, or buying them. You start with a single city and a single land unit, and you capture spice nodes to generate revenue that's used to purchase more units and upgrade cities with defenses and different building types. Housing boosts population, which supports a larger military; factories generate revenue but also cause unhappiness; and entertainment complexes boost happiness. Capture a city, and you can have it specialize in military units, religious units, or economic units. However, all you pretty much have to do is crank out units and swamp the enemy; the AI will send units your way, but not enough to mount a major push. Any real-time strategy vet won't be too hard pressed here.
And then there's Space Stage, which is by far the largest stage in the game, and the stage that is the widest open in terms of gameplay. Space is, as crazy as it sounds, a single-player massively multiplayer game. You can start flying around the galaxy, visiting a crazy number of stars and planets, some of which are barren but others supporting life in different stages. You can establish colonies on other worlds, extending the size of your empire. You can terraform planets to support life, or mold them like a giant piece of clay. You can get missions to pursue from neighboring empires. You can get into space battles, or you can crush a primitive species. You can abduct creatures from one planet and transplant them to another. In other words, you can basically play as a god, and that's always a nice rush. The space stage is the deepest part of Spore, which makes sense considering that it's also longer than all the other stages combined.
The entire campaign makes for a dizzying trip through millions of years of evolution. Thankfully, once you play through the game you can start on a new planet at any stage that you wish, so if you liked the Space Stage, just go ahead and start there. What you will miss is the timeline of your creature's evolution, as well as the ability to mold and shape your creature through the decisions that you make. Whether you choose a peaceful or a warlike path, the game rewards you with special abilities that you can use. Playing through the game does give you a sense of working your way through the ages. I got a thrill watching my little Poker creatures (named for their primitive, mosquito-like snout) crush their opposition and launch into the stars after a long struggle out of the muck.
It's worth noting just how easy it is to play Spore. Save for using the keyboard to type in the names of the things that you build in the many editors or searching for content in the Sporepedia, you can play almost the entirety of Spore just using the mouse. It's an incredibly accessible game to pick up and play, and the hefty manual that comes in the box as well as the helpful hints will get even a novice up and running quickly.
Like all Maxis games, Spore is infused with charm. The colors in the game are vibrant and warm, and even the most sinister monster ends up looking a bit cute thanks to the art design. The game ran smoothly on my admittedly high-end system, and it was rock-solid stable, never crashing. I can't even think of a single bug. Meanwhile, humor and wit are deeply embedded in Maxis' DNA, and it shows. I stumbled upon two tribe members having a Sims-style discussion, with thought bubbles over their heads and icons representing what they were talking about. They seemed intent on discussing the universe and god, and in this case, god is apparently Will Wright's head. Another hilarious and surreal moment came during the Creature Stage, when in the midst of doing the friendly dance a UFO appeared overhead and began kidnapping the panicked creatures below with its abduction beam. The sounds and music are also classic Maxis. Every chirp and warble that your creatures make seems authentic, and the dialogue sounds like alien versions of the Simlish that we've come to love. The music seems minimalist at times. When combat kicks in, the drums pound and get your blood pressure up. Yet at other times, the music takes a back seat to the sounds of your creatures' feet pounding on fresh grass and other sounds of nature.
Closing Comments I think that Maxis has made an impressive product that does so many incredible things. Spore will serve as an introduction to gaming for many; it's clear that many nontraditional gamers will check it out. As such, this feels sort of like a sampler plate to gaming, introducing newcomers to the different types of gameplay out there. But much more than that, Spore will make you think about science, and when was the last time you could say that about a game? It'll inspire people to learn more about the universe and imagine what's possible out there. Spore also pushes the idea of user-generated content to incredible new heights; this is a game where users will make the vast majority of things that you encounter, and this creation and sharing is done seamlessly. The Galactic Edition of Spore carries a $20 premium over the regular edition, and it's an attractive package that includes a National Geographic special related to Spore, a "Making of Spore" DVD, and an art book. However, these extras don't affect the gameplay at all.
Yet, while Spore is an amazing product, it's just not quite an amazing game. I can't help but feel that Spore is ambitious and memorable, but I also admit that, save for the cool Space Stage, there's not a lot of depth here. Rookie gamers are going to feel at home here, but veteran gamers may feel like they need more. Still, Spore proves to be one of the most unique products in recent memory, one that reaches for the stars and ends up giving us a universe in a box.
(For other opinions of Spore, make sure to check out GameSpy's review, IGN UK's review, and IGN Australia's review. And be sure to check out some exclusive clips from the companion TV special.)
We've been looking forward to the STALKER Clear Sky for some time now, first because we desperately wanted to return to the unique world, and second because we hoped a sequel would give the developers a chance to present a more stable and consistent experience than we got the first time around. And while the basic approach and concept of the game is still as original and interesting as ever, the rough edges make it at best unpleasant, and at worst nearly unplayable.
If you missed the first game, shame on you. The wide-open world offered a kind of freedom not seen in most first-person shooters. Loads of moody details and atmosphere gave the world a sense of depth and realism, while the unpredictable anomalies and mutants and mercenaries made it a dangerous and often terrifying place. In short, it was a strange mix of elements that managed to captivate a number of gamers in spite of its abundant bugs. Clear Sky offers more of the same, adding several entirely new elements and lots of new content but some of the changes shift the emphasis of the game into directions that may not be entirely welcomed by some fans of the original game.
We don't want to give away too much of the story, because there are some twists and turns that are probably better enjoyed as they happen. Still, the basic outline of the plot leaves a bit to be desired. Things start well as the player is knocked unconscious by a massive anomaly. He wakes up on a farm in the middle of a swamp, finding that he's been rescued by a group of scientists known as Clear Sky. From there the player will have to unravel the mystery of the anomaly and find work with a number of competing factions. You'll travel through familiar places like Cordon and meet up with some characters from the original game, but there are lots of new places and faces to see as well. And though the main storyline plays out in a linear sequence, you're free to explore the rest of the content however and whenever you choose.
The writing isn't terribly good, but it's at least enough to provide a context for your adventures in the Zone. The voice acting doesn't really help to sell the realism, mostly because of the broad delivery, but also because so much of the ambient dialogue is still in Russian. To be fair, the characters are themselves a bit flat, so it's not entirely the fault of the voice actors.
But though the inhabitants lack a lot of personality, there is a lot of personality in the environment. The visual appeal of this game world is simply amazing. From little campfires out in the wild to massive multi-level industrial complexes, the game looks and feels like a real environment and not simply a massive game level. Of course, there are still some illusion-shattering elements, like the very gentle slopes that you just can't climb, or the barbed wire fences that you simply won't cross.
As open as the world is, the world is divided up into discrete zones so you will have to load from time to time as you move from one point to another. Fortunately, there are some guides that can transport you instantly around in the zone you're in, but it would have been nicer to have guides within each zone who could transport you into nearby zones. As it is, there's a lot of walking in this game. This is one of the many features in this game whose worth is really in the eye of the beholder. Some gamers will love the sense of immersion and exploration that endless walking brings, while others will see it as a massive time sink that extends the length of the game without adding any interest to it.
To help navigate this world, the PDA has more information for you this time around. You can simply check the mini-map for the location of your next main objective and your selected secondary objective, and you'll also see the location of item stashes as well as the other inhabitants of the zone, be they friendly, hostile or dead. If you open the PDA proper, you'll have a chance to scan the entire world for any of these elements and plan your explorations with an eye towards the big picture. You'll see concentrations of friendly and enemy forces and find your own opportunities to take advantage of the overall situation.
Clear Sky introduces several competing factions that you can help or hinder as you make your way through the world. You may simply deliver ammo to a group of guards out in the wild, or you may hunt down dogs that are harassing patrols out in the wild, or you might take part in full assaults against another faction's strongholds. The faction wars are an interesting supplement to the main story, and it's easy enough to get so wrapped up in helping your faction that you lose sight of the main quest for a while. The rewards are definitely compelling. First, if your faction rules a zone, things are a lot safer for you as you travel around. You'll also have more access to secondary missions, neat delivery rewards and NPCs with whom you can trade. And because some of the factions aren't in direct competition with each other, it's possible to be friends with more than one group at a time.
Getting involved in a big firefight between two competing groups gives you a real sense of participation in the world and adds a lot to the interest of the game. Of course, just as there are players who will love all the walking you have to do here, there are bound to be some who don't like that STALKER slants a little more towards Ghost Recon with these new faction fights, but, for us, they definitely add a bit more focus and excitement to the world.
We got a call on our PDA to help defend that monstrous ruin in Garbage and when we got there, the fight was already underway. We had to shoot our way through the attackers to get to the structure where the other defenders were. As each wave of attackers came in, we'd pick them off and then make a mad dash to loot ammo and health packs from the fallen enemies. The problem was that the waves kept getting stronger and closer together and we soon realized as we were fighting them off from the highest level of the building that all our allies were already dead. Seeing no hope, we actually ran from the building and abandoned the objective to the enemies. We came back to the scene a while later and, being better armed and having something to prove, staged a one-man assault and killed every single defender. Coming back throughout the game, we knew that the guys who had set up shop in that area had us to thank for it. That type of open-ended gameplay really gave us a sense of personal accomplishment that's as precious as it is rare.
Unfortunately, there are problems with the faction missions. The triggers are either bugged or seriously unclear. We've taken objectives that were never credited to our side, and we've waited for several minutes to hold an objective against a counterattack that never came. Missions are also called out and cancelled before you really have a chance to respond, which causes some confusion. The bigger problem is that your own participation in the faction wars tilts things tremendously in favor of your side. The Garbage incident sticks out so much in our mind precisely because it's one of the rare occasions where the faction fights presented a real challenge to our skills. Playing properly and with patience, most gamers will win control of a zone with very little trouble.
But on the other hand, the combat itself is exceptionally challenging, both in terms of the abilities of your opponents and the bases created by the level designers. Your enemies can throw grenades now, which sounds fun, but in practice winds up being more a source of frustration. They have uncanny accuracy and can drop a grenade literally right between your feet, even when you're standing thirty yards away...in some bushes...at night...behind a rock. Outside of the grenade problem, the AI fights reasonably well, using cover where appropriate and advancing on you without running straight into your fire.
To tilt the advantage in your favor, the game offers a wealth of options to customize your weapons. You'll spend cash to increase the size of the magazine, or minimize recoil, or extend the muzzle velocity or accuracy. There are so many options here that you really can start to create very specialized weapons that help you play the game the way you want to play it. We took a pretty standard rifle and outfitted it with all manner of upgrades until it really managed to surpass every other weapon we found. The only real pain here is that you'll soon start to run short of cash, even without taking into account the frustrating loss of your items during the course of the game.
The lack of cash is compounded by the scarcity of artifacts and the dangers required to obtain them. Where the first game was littered with artifacts, there almost impossible to find this time around, and the locations where they happen to be are ridiculously deadly. It doesn't help that you need to have your tracker in your hand, but you can't really shoot the anomalies anyway, so it doesn't matter in any case. The anomalies themselves are as deadly as ever, and this time they crop up with less warning. You can still spot them by the telltale gouts of flame or swirling leaves but they can descend with sudden fury if you're not paying attention.
And as before, the game has more bugs than an ant colony. We were actually halted in the campaign by a number of bugs, one of which we never found a way around. No one on the forums seems to be complaining about this particular bug, but there are a few other complaints of a similar nature. We also found that entire regions would be stripped of NPCs at random, requiring us to save and reload the game in order to make them reappear again. In some cases we weren't entirely sure if an irregularity meant the game was broken or was just part of the story. This is, after all, a game about anomalies. But there are far too many inconsistencies that just ruin the illusion, and sometimes even ruin your progress.
To be sure, many of these issues are likely to be addressed in patches but it's simply too much to bear in the meantime, particularly since the original game was criticized for the same sort of instability. There are fans that will be willing to endure these problems for the sake of the things that the game gets right, trusting that GSC will resolve the biggest issues in the very near future. It's just a shame that the experience isn't more reliable right out of the box.
At least let us quick load from the death screen without having to go back to the main menu.
On the plus side, we don't seem to have run into any of the performance problems that some people have had. And that's a great thing because this game has an amazing visual presentation. Yes, enemies can shoot through trees and, yes, sometimes soldiers will stand in a campfire, but for the most part the world is rendered with a tremendous attention to detail. Small flowers dot the hillsides, rust is taking hold of the steps of a nearby watchtower, and the sideview mirrors on an abandoned jeep are cracked and grimy. Everywhere you look in this world, there's something to see and it's easy to get a sense that this is a world that someone use to live in and where the rooms in the buildings had a specific purpose.
The character models are wonderfully detailed, with loads of pockets and patches and clips and all the usual suspects of military fashion. The few characters who aren't staring at you through masks have wonderfully animated faces, full of personality and life. Even the mutants and dogs seem to have a real credibility here, though it's hard to appreciate when you're being clawed to death. It's especially hard to appreciate the spectacle of a death by anomaly but in those few seconds before your brain implodes, you can take note of the grainy filter, the reddening skies and the huge gouts of flame. Then you can appreciate the quick save function.
As disappointing as the voice work is, the rest of the sound palette is generally very good. The weapon sounds lend believability to the firefights and you'll honestly start to get a little thrill from walking through the wilderness and suddenly hearing the sounds of a far off battle. Sound is particularly useful in helping to set the tension of the game. We found ourselves crawling through tall grass at night to take out an enemy camp. The sounds of the night were a great backdrop for our rustlings as we moved through the grass. Just as we were getting close to the camp and could hear the guards talking, we started to hear the snuffling and snorting of some animals nearby. Trying to keep your cool in moments like that is just impossible.
Of course, the effect is spoiled somewhat by the terrible dynamic music that kicks in when a fight starts. Though the overall score is generally very good, the combat music is distracting both in terms of its tone and its quality. Thankfully, there's an option to disable it.
Closing Comments Though all games have their fans, unique games like STALKER seem to generate particularly enthusiastic followers, and deservedly so. The first game presented a very unique experience and, by and large, Clear Sky sticks close to that model. So if you liked the first game because it was big and dense and scary, then you'll like Clear Sky for the same reasons. And if you like the original but wish that it offered more GRAW-style action, then Clear Sky is even better.
Not everything works, of course. The faction fights seem too easy, which is balanced out, we suppose, by the ridiculously accurate grenade throws. The story doesn't offer much of a foundation for the action, either. The real shame of it all is that the game was let out the door with so many bugs, some that merely slowed our progress and dampened our enjoyment, and one that actually stopped us cold. Many of these issues are bound to be addressed in upcoming patches but we'd wait until the game has at least a few under its belt before trying to tackle it again.
Contrary to popular opinion, life does not begin at forty. It is not a bowl of cherries, nor is it anything like a box of chocolates.
Life is a game. And a damn fine one at that.
The brainchild of Sims honcho Will Wright, Maxis' long-awaited Spore lets gamers create a new species and guide it from the dregs of the primordial soup to the apex of the intergalactic food chain. And that's just the half of it. From its amazing Creature Creator to its downright groundbreaking integration of user-created content, Spore aims to please gamers of all kinds -- and for the most part, it will. This isn't the game of evolution, it's the evolution of games.
Several games, actually. Spore breaks life down into five stages -- Cell, Creature, Tribe, Civilization and Space -- that increase in both difficulty and complexity, each crammed to the gills (or paws, or thumbs, maybe) with customized goals, features and mechanics. The fear was that this would result in a disjointed mess, but somehow the designers keep the five stages nicely tethered together with a streamlined design aesthetic. Whether you're nibbling on an opposing cell's flagella, serenading a potential ally, gathering baskets of fruit for your tribe, storming an enemy civilization's stronghold or terraforming planets from the comfort of your spaceship, you'll know just what to do. Spore never feels overwhelming.
It also never gets stale. You can play aggressively or passively (the former is, unsurprisingly, far easier), and the way you behave in each stage has direct ramifications on later levels. You're constantly presented with achievable goals, each pushing you closer to triggering the ability to move to the next evolutionary rank (you can even skip straight to any of the five levels provided you've played them at least once). It's a not-so-subtle design shift that saves the game from the common sim pitfall of plodding repetition and increases the game's instant-play appeal tremendously.
"Spore aims to please gamers of all kinds -- and for the most part, it will. This isn't the game of evolution, it's the evolution of games."
That is, until you get sucked into the black hole of the game's lengthy final stage. You'll spend far more time in Space than anywhere else, and it starts out great. Astonishing, even, especially when you realize the ball of rock you call home is but one of millions, all accessible with your trusty spaceship, and many of which contain hidden treasures or alien life.
But as you expand your empire and interact with other sentient beings, the game starts acting up a bit, inundating you with repetitive tasks in an odd, manic attempt to keep you from wandering off. Wars turn into constant homeworld invasions, prompting you to just start making friends with everyone so you can get cracking on solving the game's final riddle. Exploring is still fun, but you'll soon miss the simple joy of evolutionary experimentation.
Or more specifically, you'll miss tinkering around in the amazing Creature Creator, the infinitely flexible, 3D Mr. Potato Head that lies at the heart of Spore. Much of the early game is spent acquiring all manner of claw, foot and maw as you continually evolve your creature from a floating ball of tissue to a sentient, multi-limbed monstrosity; eventually, you'll use the Creator to build vehicles, buildings, and UFOs in the Civilization and Space stages. Best of all, you don't need a degree from Pixar U. to feel like a master craftsman. The robust yet easy-to-use tool might be the star of Spore's show, as it routinely steals the spotlight from the core game. You can (and will) lose hours plucking, pulling, nipping and tucking your creations, and by and large, what comes out of your handiwork will actually look and sound pretty cool.
And you don't have to do a thing to show it off. Every one of your creations is silently uploaded to the massive Sporepedia, then used to populate everyone else's game world. Not only has that scale of user-sharing never graced a game before, but it works like a charm. Obviously it's a bit hit-or-miss -- not every Spore player is a Rembrandt, leading to some ghastly evolutionary misfires. Regardless, the endless pool of content makes each world feel truly unique, and unless all Spore players suddenly stop creating, the well won't dry up any time soon.
Occasionally -- and perhaps unavoidably -- Spore buckles under its own weight. Hardcore strategy buffs accustomed to waypoints and build queues will be put off by the total lack of such features, while the oversimplified AI can suck some of the fun out of diplomacy. But to stare at the fine points is to miss the beauty of the view -- and make no mistake, it's a bee-yooot. Spore takes so many risks and introduces so many new concepts, it's far more than the sum of its parts; it's video game history in the making. Join in.
