I'm sure we've all heard the buzz surrounding Halo [and it's sequel]: "10/10", "the best FPS ever", "the best GAME ever" and so on. But does Halo truly live up to all this hype?
Graphics:
The very first thing you notice about Halo is the graphics. Though the game is now several years old, the graphics are still suprisingly good even standing beside some of the newer PC games. Up close the textures are very high-res and detailed, though the begin to get blurred at even a short distance. The poly count for the characters and enemies is fairly high and mainy of the lighting effects [especially light filtering through the branches of trees] looks great. Metalic surfaces have an extra coat of glossy finish, which is made clearer when using your flashlight. All things considered, it looks great. The one downside to the graphics is that the art style is just too drab, it has little life too it and many areas are repeated for too many times.
Story:
The storyling is somewhat standard sci-fi fare. It involves a race of aliens known as the Covenant who are bent on destroying the Earth empire. It's up to you as Master Chief, intergalatic tough-guy, to make sure that doesn't happen. Unfortunately, you're strandedd on a ring-world called Halo, but no to worry, the Convenant are also there too, so there's plenty of alien-killing to be done. Things do begin to get a bit more complex in the later half of the game, but don't expect anything along the lines of 2001. It's a pretty much straight-forward and simple storyline, but it does what it needs to and it's not a downside.
Controls:
The left analog stick controls movement and the right controls your aim. The best set-up you can hope for without a keyboard and mouse. It works well though, and is simple enough to use.
Sound:
The machine guns of the future sound a lot like you might expect them too and explosions sound the same no matter what year you're in. It also has some decent voice work, which can do wonders for any game. Also, the music [from what I can remember] works well for the game, but didn't seem TOO memorable. That having been said, the game does sound pretty good.
Gameplay:
Unfortunately, the game struggles in this sector. You'd think a game where you play as the coolest warrior in the universe fighting hordes of alien scum could never get boring even in a million years, but you'd be wrong. By the time you've fought the same three types of aliens, in the same grey corridor for the hundredth time it becomes a chore to pick up the controller again. About half the game is boring, while the other half is actually rather fun. If you can overcome the monotony that plagues the boring half, or can find someone to co-op with you, you should be able to beat the game in about 10-15 hours. It's worth it to finally see the end, but getting their isn't easy and not for the right reasons. The multiplayer deathmatch, I've been told, is incredibly fun and makes up for some of the moring boring parts of the singleplayer, but I haven't played much of it myself.
Conclusion:
Despite it's amazing graphics and tight controls, Halo suffers from drab art style and gameplay that repeats itself too many times. It's a fun game, and one of the better console FPSs, but there are better games out there. If you're a scifi junkie and don't have a computer, you'll likely want to give it a go. If you're not a big fan of FPSs and find repetition to be a major turn off, you may want to consider a different game.
Welcome to the TendoCity Reviews Forum. I am EdenMaster, The Review King, and I'll be your host tonight. If you care to post any reiews, there are a few rules and standards to which we would like you to abide.
<b>1. Limited replying</b> - Replies to reviews are allowed, but only on the condition that the replies and ensuing banter pertain to the reviewed game (or even series, such as comparing a game to it's predecessor or sequel). All off-topic posts will be deleted.
<b>2. Minimum length</b> - Reviews should not be curt, tiny little paragraphs about the game. We want detail. A minimum of about 500 words is sufficient. I probably won't be strict on that number, but enough to fill a page should be fine. Any that I deem too short will be requested to be lengthened, or I will delete them. There is no maximum length, so go nuts.
<b>3. Paragraph format</b> - We would prefer reviews tohave a set format. We want to see what attributes the game has. Sound, gameplay, graphics, replayablity, story. Break it down. There won't be any set categories to reviw a game under, but the ones I mentioned are the usual ones to focus on.
<b>4. Scoring</b> - We request that at end of your review, you summarize the game briefly and score the game. The scoring system will consist of a scale of 0.0 to 10.0, obviously with 0 as the lowest, and 10 as the highest. A score of 7 or so is about an average game. Also, though it may be difficult, try to be objective. While you may think of a game as the best in the world, think hard to come up with anything that you don't like, as it may be an important factor for those considering purchasing the game. We prefer that you score the games you review, if you do not wish to score a game all, it's not a requirement.
<b>5. Title</b> - Please make the title of your reviews limited to the name of the game and nothing more. for indexing purposes, having a review with the title "My Halo Review" just makes things difficult.
Any new rules that may need added, will be. For now, please abide by these guidelines. Thank you.
Jedi Knight: Mysteries of the Sith (expansion pack to 1997's Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II)
1998, Lucasarts
Review written 1/31/2004 (Gamefaqs); posted and edited/added to on TC homepage late 2004; reposted in this reviews forum 5/22/2005.
Jedi Knight. A great and, at the time, innovative first person shooter. I am a huge Star Wars fan, so I loved the game. Mysteries of the Sith is the add-on for Jedi Knight, and is a very worthy follow up. Jedi Knight and Mysteries of the Sith is my favorite FPS.
Jedi Knight and Mysteries of the Sith are very similar, as is expected from an add-on. But in this case that is a good thing because Jedi Knight is an extremely well done game. It does not add much to Jedi Knight's formula, except for being able to use both the dark and light force at the same time, and adding more guns, but that is okay because Jedi Knight was already among the best in the genre in this category. Jedi Knight is unique. It's a slower paced game than Quake. The force powers make for a great twist and can make gameplay quite interesting. The weapons are also powerful, and the game adds some great new ones like a sniper scope for the stormtrooper rifle -- each weapon now has a second function --, but the focus of the game is on the force and the lightsaber, not the weapons. As it should be. One other way it shows its uniqueness best is by how its engine can display large areas competently and do it so often. Yes, by today's standards the graphics are badly out of date, but if you can look past that you will see a game doing the best it can with the graphical limitations of the engine it is in. And besides, I like the game's look. It is a nice representation of Star Wars and, as I said, does large outdoor areas very nicely, unlike most engines from when it came out. Quake is painfully bad at doing outdoor areas and even Quake III, whose engine is used in Jedi Knight 2 and 3, had problems here... none in this game. You are frequently in areas which stretch into the horizon. This sense of scale helps make the already brilliant level designs of JK/MoTS even better. To me, while they have many strengths, the best part about Jedi Knight is its brilliant level designs. Level design is key to gameplay, and Jedi Knight succeeded brilliantly. Mysteries of the Sith continues that tradition, with more levels in the same style of Jedi Knight. Some are even better than the best ones in Jedi Knight, amazingly, given how good some levels are in the original game.
The last three levels, especially, are very memorable. I would say that that group of three still has yet to be equalled in any FPS... they are just that good. The only gameplay problem I can think of would come in here, however. The first 11 levels are good, but do not prepare you for the challenge and uniqueness of the last three. When you reach them, you will be in for something of a shock as the difficulty suddenly jumps up several levels and you lose all your guns, for good. I truly loved this part of the game, however, so I think that perhaps they should have reduced the doing small quests part in the middle of the game and expanded the final segment. It would have been great if there had been more than three levels on the planet, given how unique they are. Large, quite long, very challenging levels are the hallmark of Jedi Knight and they are fully in evidence here. They also can frequently be confusing and make you search the levels for where to go next all the time, and with frequent (but admittedly mostly switch-based -- though not all. Some are inventive.) puzzles. but again, I like this aspect of the game. It is a refreshing change from your average FPS where it is nearly impossible to get lost. Of course the automap helps greatly here, and again Jedi Knight's great automap system comes in very handy. Without it the game would definitely be a lot harder, and having it is a major plus. I think all FPSes should have automaps and am sad to see now few of newer FPSes have them. The level design in these games stands out especially well when compared to Jedi Knight 2 or 3, who have better looks but simpler and less complex level designs that just do not compare at all to the original JK.
I only have one real complaint with the gameplay system of Mysteries of the Sith. The game changes the force powers system. Like in JK, after each mission you can choose force powers. But this time you can choose any, not just light or dark. And there isn't a branching mission path for being good or evil. This means that you can have both Force Heal and Force Grab... which just doesn't seem right to me. You shouldn't be able to casually mix good and evil powers in the extent you can in this game. It's not nearly as bad as the force power mixing in JK2, and I will admit that the Star Wars universe has provided for the possibility of people having powers from both sides, but it also says that generally any use of many Dark Side powers is bad and can't be just ignored. This game doesn't deal with that. I don't know if this bothers anyone else, but it did bother me. Because of this the gameplay gets a 9, not a 10. They should have dealt with this better. I do understand that because of which character you play as after Kyle that having dark side powers is probably to be expected, but they don't deal with the issue at all in the story or in the game. If they are going to allow you to have powers from both side like this they definitely should make a bigger deal of it -- it's just not okay for anyone to go around hitting people with Force Lightning and expecting no major affect on your light-side powers!
The story is the one admittedly weak element. They got rid of the FMV cutscenes, probably a good move, and replaced them with in-engine ones, but the story doesn't flow nearly as well. The game is broken up into groups of levels that are each stories but only have some things in common with eachother. It does feel like a group of mini-missions at times. It does have a story, though, and that story is better if you have read some of the Star Wars books, particularly Timothy Zahn's popular, and great, trilogy of books that the games draw greatly from. If you haven't read those books, however, a lot of things in the game just won't make as much sense. It explains things well enough ingame, but it makes it more interesting if you know the backstory. Still, each of the level groups really does have a seperate theme and story that only carries over on some issues. This is definitely the biggest flaw in the game, and don't get this if you want a great and deep plot. It is good enough, however, and I have read the books so I loved seeing things from them in a Star Wars game -- that does not happen very often. AAnd when you consider how great the gameplay is in the single player game, and how the level designs match Jedi Knight for brilliance, I can mostly overlook the somewhat flawed story. Single Player gets a 9. But subtract a point or two for the story if you haven't read the Zahn trilogy.
Graphically, as I said, the game is unmistakably old. Low polygon count, not that great texture detail, amazingly bad water... no one would play this game for its looks, and if you can't get over that you will not like the game. But I like it because it presents the Star Wars universe very well, and allows for that massive scale. I give it an 9, considering when the game was released. I'd like to give it a 10, but even for then the engine was not exactly the best looking one out there. Based on today's graphics of course it looks very bad, but judging old games by the graphical standards of now is not fair. And anyway, none of those better looking competitors could make levels as massive and lengthy as this one.
The game's sound is very good. All the sounds sound very similar to the movie sounds, which is great. And the music can be really good. Yes, it is mostly just remixes of the movie music, but it is presented very, very well. I especially like the music in the last level, perhaps because of how much time I spent confused in it before figuring out how to progress... Nothing to complain about here. Unless you hate Star Wars music. 10.0
The final major aspect of JK:MoTS is the multiplayer. It is essentially the same as the multiplayer in Jedi Knight, just with some more characters and levels to choose from. Still, given how good the multiplayer is in the main game, again, the best thing for them to do was not change things much. Also, some of the new levels are great, and the added force powers make things interesting since force is one of the most unique and fun aspects of the Jedi Knight series. The heavy multiplayer focus on force powers and the lightsaber, and not just running around with the biggest gun like in most multiplayer FPSes, is refreshing, and the level designs are quite good. 10.0.
In conclusion, Jedi Knights: Mysteries of the Sith is a brilliant expansion to one of the greatest first-person shooters of all time. Especially if you're a Star Wars fan, certainly, but it has enough good things about it that everyone should try the game. The graphics haven't stood up to time very well, and plenty of other games have done scripted events and puzzles, but Jedi Knight and its similar expansion have held up great.
And those last three levels... wow. Completely unique gameplay. Without spoiling anything, the final level of this game is one of the greatest FPS levels of all time, I would say, and is a true work of art. It is a hard and frustrating games at time and getting lost or stuck not knowing where to go is easy, but it is well worth it to get to the end. Also, if you buy Jedi Knight these days Mysteries of the Sith is included in the box, so they work as one long game. A true masterpiece, and it's too bad that Lucasarts didn't keep this team together to do a sequel. I'm sure they would have done a better job than Raven.
But if you aren't a hardcore gamer, keeping a FAQ handy might be a good idea for this game. It's well, well worth it, however, so don't give up. Fantastic game.
Gameplay - 10/10
Graphics - 9/10
Sound - 10/10
Single Player - 9/10
Multiplayer - 10/10
Other/Value - 10/10
97% (calculated average of those six categories -- and a good score for the final product as well)
Okay, so you've played Advance Wars. Time to step it up a notch with this wonderful, until recently Japan-only series. Fire Emblem for the GBA is the first game of the series to see a US release, but it's the 7th game in the series from Japan.
The concept is simple, yet so very complex. As you start the game, you are a tactician, and you wake up in the house of Lyn, a nomad from the Sacae plains. As the two of you speak, you learn of her tragic past and of her limitless resolve. Then, a noise outside startles the girl, and she runs outside. Finding a small band of thugs descending on her house, she requests your aid as a battle tactician to fight them off. They pose little challenge (None actually, the game holds your hand through this entire battle), and afterwards Lyn decides to journey to find out who she really is. Little did she know how much there was to find.
If you only had Lyn (and further in the game, the game switches to two other characters, Eliwood and Hector, as the "main" characters), you wouldn't make it very far in the harsh, bandit filled world. As such, in your travels, you come upon dozens of soldiers willing to join your cause. The romantic buffoon Sain. The proud cavalier Kent. The axe-weilding Dorcas just looking for money to help his family. The male-fearing Pegasus rider Florina. The arrogant and annoying Serra. The list goes on and on, each character has their own personality and reason for joining you. Each party member becomes close to you, which makes it hard to see them...die.
Yes, die. Fighters who lose all of their HP aren't just "Phoenix Down" dead. They're "FMV Sequence" dead, and they ain't coming back (Although some who die in Lyn's chapter may reappear "healed" during Eliwoods chapter). This throws and interesting dynamic into the game. Do you really want to risk your archer getting near enough to a boss to kill him so they can get the experience, or send in your unstoppable Paladin for a guaranteed kill, but wasting the experience on someone who does't need it (you who've played, you KNOW what Paladin I'm referring to).
On to the weapons. Each character weilds three types of weapons and magic. For weapons, axes, spears, and swords, and most characters can only weild one or two types. As for magic, there is Light, Dark, and Anima (elemental) magic tomes. Now then, the easiest way to describe the weapon system is rock-paper-scissors. Rock beats scissors, scissors beat paper, paper beats rock. In the same way, axes beat spears, spears beat swords, and swords beat axes. This is a *crucial* order to learn, so you know who to send in to take on what enemies. Sending in a swordfighter to attack an enemy with a spear will end badly for you, but send in someone with an axe, and now you're talking. There are some slight deviations though. Airborne units like Pegasus Knights take double damage from arrows. The same three-way hierarchy applies to magic too.
For a GBA game, Fire Emblem musters quite an epic story, and lasts quite a while too (30 individual battles in all, not counting extra ones that can be obtained). All things considered, this is one of the flagship titles on the Game Boy Advance right now. If you enjoyed Advance Wars, Fire Emblem will blow you away.
If you didn't notice, Majesco is making a DS version. But it's a remake/new game, not a rerelease, so who knows if it'll be good... we can hope though, right (just don't hope too much, this is Majesco after all!)? :)
I've actually been working on Tendo City lately. It's good to have free time again. I just wanted to talk about some of the things coming (and going).
First, the going. We all know how successful we've been trying to operate a dynamic, up-to-date webpage. It hasn't worked, and it's unlikely it ever will. We don't have the time, the manpower, or the interest to keep it going. When it was up, few read it, and most of the important stuff ended up on the forums anyway.
So, I am going to do away with it, somewhat.
It's true that there were some features of the page that people did like. Those I will keep, and restore from long ago death. Creativity will be brought back, with links to Comics, Shiggies, and other creative works made by Tendocitizens.
Reviews are now finally a part of the forum itself. They are now easily seen, easily accessed, and easy to post to. You'll see them every time you come to the boards, so there's no excuse not to drop in and write one yourself every now and then! I will need someone to perform moderating duties for Reviews, and unlike other mods, this one actually will have to do work, as I don't want non-Review threads or posts in this forum, and they will be moved out or deleted. Yes, there are actually rules at TC, whod've thought? :D
The last major announcement is the Archives.
This is the final thread ever posted in Rumble City:
Quote:Over the last three hours, Abstractica and I painstakingly saved every single remaining thread in the entirety of Rumble City, from all 34 pages of RC's topics, to Ramble and ROTM and even Forum5. I will make an effort to eventually archive them somewhere, so that we will always have our history.ana, thanks again, from the bottom of my heart.
Long Live Rumble! I will see everyone at Tendo, for this is my farewell post here.
I have been promising to build these archvies forever. Now, thanks to a brilliant Dark Jaguar idea, all of these threads I've had for so long have finally been given the works. All of them have fixed images, working links, and everything. They are just as you will remember them. What remains is that these threads need to be indexed. This will take a while, as it will likely have to be done by hand.
I also have all of the TC threads from Apr. 2001 - Dec. 2002, and they will also be given the works and archived the same way. Since there is a lot more complexity involved here, it will take awhile longer.
But there is finally light at the end of the tunnel, and I can finally make good on the promise I made four years ago.
So, there's going to be a need for help with the indexing. Anyone who has a good HTML editor, some time and a lot of patience... I'd love to have you on board to help. We're also going to have to do some major spring cleaning of the server.
Quote:IGN reported today that the short Metroid Prime 3 teaser footage shown at Nintendo's Tuesday press conference was actually only a small part of the footage that was on-hand and available to be shown. The game, announced for Nintendo's next-generation console, is apparently well under development at Retro Studios, the developer of the first two Metroid Prime games. When asked why Nintendo would hold back on additional media for what is one of the company's most popular franchises set to appear on its currently most talked-about (and whispered about) project, Nintendo's Perrin Kaplan had this to say:
"Several of us felt pretty strongly that we didn't want people to misperceive that Metroid Prime 3 was our big [Revolution] launch title because that's not what it was intended to mean," Kaplan said. "And we really want to feel like we want to make sure we have a compilation with a lot of stuff that we're really happy with before we show it. It's like showing one finger of a hand doesn't make sense."
Disappointing news to be sure, as many fans had anticipated (and in some cases hoped for) a deluge of Revolution information as well as footage. Although it does not look like this E3 will provide that intimate look, the promise has been made and it would seem that Nintendo has indeed ensured that all eyes will be on them when they finally decide to pull back the covers completely from their new flagship project. For now, fans will need to rest easy with the knowledge that game development is deeply underway at each of Nintendo's talented internal teams.
They should have showed it anyway...and some more games too. Oh well.
Quote:Speaking to Reuters at E3, Nintendo President Satoru Iwata confirms more info on Revolution before the year's end.
"We plan to give details on when we will launch it, what the price will be, what the controller will look like and how games can be played on it by the end of the year," said Nintendo's Satoru Iwata, who disregarded critism levelled against the company for not showing more of the console at E3, saying he didn't want to "to tip his hand" to rivals.
He said the company was already talking to third-party game publishers about including their old Nintendo-compatible games in the downloadable archives. Could this mean an original Goldeneye or Perfect Dark could appear on the Revolution?
He commented that while pricing of the downloadable games had not been decided, he said the company was thinking of various methods of getting them out there. They could charge users per game, or sell pre-paid cards in stores, or even give some games away as part of promotions.
Additionally, when asked about the newly unveiled GBA Micro, Iwata commented the GBA SP would continue to be made, and that Nintendo had not yet decided on a price point for the latest GBA incarnation.
Hopefully it's several months before the end of the year. *Spaceworld!!*
Quote:GamesIndustry.biz: One question on the lips of many people at the moment: how much of what we saw in the PlayStation 3 demos was actually running in real-time?
Phil Harrison: Everything in the demos was real-time.
And what about the game footage clips?
Not all of that - in fact, none of it was real-time because it was all running off video. If you make a presentation to two and a half thousand people, you're going to put some of it on video just to be on the safe side.
I've been asked this question a lot. The way we put those videos together, everything was done to specification. Everything was done to PS3 spec. Virtually everything used in-game assets; some things were rendered.
How representative of what we're actually going to be seeing in PS3 games were those videos?
I think very. I think depending on the game, different games took a different approach to their way of expressing what the games are like - but clearly, something like Motor Storm uses more cinematic, replay-like cameras than you would ever enjoy in-game. So that makes a big difference... But everything is done to spec.
Quote:Is the Killzone sequence a fair example of what people can expect from realtime gameplay on PlayStation 3? Jan-Bart: Yeah, it's basically a representation of the look and feel of the game we're trying to make.
And just today during a G4 interview with the Sony VP Marketing Director he commented it was actual gameplay, and it's going to play exactly like that.
