"Bleed" Review: All Bad Heroes Deserve To Die

Bleed is a fast-paced 2D pixel-art twin-stick shooter style action-platformer.  Wow, that is a whole bunch of loaded words.  But its also all true.  Bleed is an independent game from one-man developer BootDisk Revolution.

Bleed stars Wryn, a plucky, pink-haired girl action girl determined to become the next great hero.  How will she do itaaa?  Simple: kill the old heroes.  Why?  Because they’re not good anymore.  The best heroes of the world have gone bad in their old age, living off the proceeds of their earlier heroics, and remaining in power due to their reputations preceding them.  Its Wryn’s dream to become the next great hero, and how better to do that than to go and make all those old heroes dead?

Not a hero anymore.

To take her place as the newest hero, Wryn traverses several platforming stages, wielding various amounts of high powered weaponry, acrobatics, and bullet-time to defeat the former heroes and their minions.

Wryn controls with precision, and she needs to to beat the odds.  She moves at a quick pace, with excellent air control when she jumps.  While in the air, she can dash up to three times with complete air control, including the ability to make arcs and change direction.

Not a hero either.

When Wryn fights, well its a twin-stick shooter through and through.  She starts with trusty dual pistols and a rocket launcher, but can unlock more, including a laser, flamethrower, and a badass, bullet deflecting katana.  Press the right control-stick in a direction, Wryn shoots, not much else to know.  And then, of course, is Wryn’s other tool of heroism: BULLET-TIME!  Or rather, slow-motion.  She can slow down time for a short period of time, allowing more fine control over her moving, shooting, and dashing, and its needed to survive.

Wryn fights against exploding cats, giant worms, robot eyes, the insides of a giant dragon.  Each stage is punctuated by a by mid-boss battle against a giant robotic Core, and the gone-bad hero Wryn is there to kill.  These bosses are the real meat of the game.  Each one has its own patterns and tests Wryn's skills and reactions to avoiding their attacks while keeping up the pressure and beating them as quickly as possible.

In your base, opening your doors.

Wryn, she's also a bit self-aware as well.  She knows she's a character being controlled by the player.  She seems pretty okay with that, as long as that player isn't entirely bad at playing, and she'll let them know, on the continue screen, if she thinks you did bad, or it was bad luck.

Bleed also contains other options.  Stages are scored based on difficulty level, deaths, and a combo meter affected by making and taking hits.  A portion of that score is given to Wryn to use on upgrades to her health and slow-motion, and unlocking other weapons.  There's an arcade mode to play through the entire game on a single life.  Multiple unlockable characters give different weapons and slow-motion effects.

Or just running away.

Difficulty levels affect enemy numbers, placement, and aggressiveness.  Thankfully, higher difficulty doesn't affect how much damage Wryn gives or takes, which is often the method used to make things difficult for lesser heroes.  They don't hit harder, there are simply more of them.

But my bottom line, this is a good, short game.  The platforming itself is not terribly difficult, with the primary difficulty coming from dealing with enemies while performing the platforming, and going against the more complex bosses.  And the overall difficulty itself doesn't feel unfair, requiring performance over luck.  Its only a few dollars to buy, and worth the handful of hours it'll take to complete.

A Winner Is You!

Disclosure:  Bleed is available for PC on Steam, Desura, the developer's website, and  Xbox 360 Indies.  This review was written based on the PC Steam release version.

My Next Top List! Or Possibly Just A List...

Wow, its been awhile, and while I have been around, I haven't been doing anything here.  And that's a shame.

I need to rectify that.

So what did I miss?  Well, its a long list, some of which I probably should talk about at some point...

Note:  This list is not all encompassing or in any particular order, and only includes games that:

1. I have played since the last time I posted here (which appears to be in early 2011)
2. Games that I currently own physically on the appropriate medium of that system, EXCEPT for the Xbox 360 list, since that information (and shame) is readily accessible thanks to MS's cross-platform integration.
3. Does not include PC games, or downloadable games (again, except for Xbox 360)

Videogames (things you play with your hands on a telephoto infotainment square)
-XBox 360 (Clippy tested and approved)

• Comic Jumper
• Alpha Protocol
• Battlefield: Bad Company 2
• Tron: Evolution (don't judge me!)
• Beyond Good & Evil HD
• Stacking
• X-MEN Arcade
• Dead Space Ignition (didn't pay for this one)
• LEGO Star Wars III
• Dragon Age II
• Hard Corps: Uprising
• Bulletstorm
• Warriors Orochi 2
• Portal 2
• Banjo Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts
• Earth Defense Force: Insect Armageddon
• From Dust
• Bastion
• Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine
• Orcs Must Die!
• Enslaved
• Rage
• Renegade Ops
• Nier
• Alice: Madness Returns
• Darksiders
• Iron Brigade (formerly Trenched)
• Final Fantasy XIII
• Rayman Origins
• Halo CE: Anniversary
• The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings
• L.A. Noire
• Final Fantasy XIII-2
• Skylanders:  Spyro's Adventure
• Torchlight
• Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning
• Syndicate
• Saints Row: The Third
• Asura's Wrath
• Borderlands
• Deus Ex: Human Revolution
• Child of Eden
• Dust: An Elysian Tail
• Assassin's Creed III
• Dishonered
• Sleeping Dogs
• Metal Gear Solid HD
• Anarchy Reigns
• Lollipop Chainsaw
• Halo 4
• Retro City Rampage
• Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance
• Dead Space 3
• Tomb Raider (2012)
• Metro: Last Light
• LEGO Lord of the Rings
• Lord of the Rings: War in the North
• Remember Me
• Minecraft
• Far Cry 3
• Deadpool (I demand tacos!!!)
• The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
• Dungeons and Dragons" Chronicles of Mystara
• Mass Effect 3
• Battlefield 3
• Charlie Murder
• Resident Evil 5 
• Borderlands 2
• Shadows of the Damned
• Saints Row IV
• Bioshock Infinite
• Dark Souls
• Dark Souls II
• Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy 13
• South Park:  The Stick of Truth

-Playstation 3 (surprise, I actually do have one of these)

• Mod Nation Racers
• No More Heroes: Heroes' Paradise
• Disgaea 4:  A Promise Unforgotten
• Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch
• Dragon's Crown (I chose the elf, thank you very much)
• Tales of Xillia
• Disgaea D2: A Brighter Darkness
• Kingdom Hearts: HD 1.5 ReMIX
• Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD

-Nintendo Wii (I regret nothing)

• Sin and Punishment: Star Successor
• The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
• Xenoblade Chronicles (PAL)
• Xenoblade Chronicles (NA)
• The Last Story
• Pandora's Tower

Nintendo Wii U (I own all of these)

• Nintendo Land
• New Super Mario Brothers U
• ZombiU
• Need For Speed: Most Wanted U (this is actually a really good port)
• LEGO City Undercover
• Batman: Arkham City: Armored Edition
• The Wonderful 101
• Rayman Legends
• The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD
• Deus Ex: Human Revolution: Director's Cut
• Super Mario 3D World

Nintendo DS (I don't remember most of what I had for this thing)

• Sands of Destruction
• Infinite Space
• Super Robot Taisen OG Saga: Endless Frontier
• Radiant Historia

Nintendo 3DS (as if this list wasn't long enough already)

• Dead Or Alive Dimensions
• Pilotwings Resort
• The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D
• Kid Icarus: Uprising
• Super Mario 3D Land
• Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy
• Bravely Default

Dead Space 2 Review

This reviewer is not the biggest fan of horror, let alone the survival-horror videogame genre.  So it is rather strange that Alien is one of the few films of this type that this reviewer likes, and the original Dead Space managed to hit all of the same notes that made the film so haunting and memorable.  And now, just a short time ago, EA and Visceral Games released the first official sequel, and only made things better.

Dead Space 2 begins 3 years after the events that took place on the USG Ishimura during Dead Space.  The protagonist, Isaac Clarke wakes up in a mental institution on The Sprawl, a massive space station located in the mined out remains of Saturn’s moon Titan, with no recollection of the intervening years.  Things are not as they seem, of course, as just as he is about to be rescued by some supposed friends, a new necromorph outbreak is beginning on the station.  The story follows as Isaac tries in vain to escape the station and in the process uncovers more of the continuing machinations and conflict between the Earth Government and the Unitology Church over the alien Marker.

Now, the original Dead Space was already impressive on a visual and audio level.  It had some of the most impressive visuals for the year it was released, and is still one of the best implementations of 5.1 positional/directional audio in any game, even now.  The style was that of an homage to Riddley Scott’s Alien, with the claustrophobic, techno-industrial interiors with low, sometimes no, lighting, and lots of sound to keep the player jumping, even when there are no enemies around.  Gameplay was very much about using weapons to dismember your opponents and survive to escape the ship.  Its only real problems were that the overall objectives were rather samey throughout, and that most of the enemies spawned from rather obvious monster closets.

So if Dead Space is Alien, then Dead Space 2 would definitely be James Cameron’s Aliens.  By all accounts bigger, louder, and often just as harrowing and tense as the first.  Dead Space 2 takes the same basic formula and improves on it without breaking anything in the process.

The first and most obvious improvements are on the graphical fidelity.  In the original Dead Space, no character was ever shown close-up in frame, even main character Isaac.  Lighting helped obscure creatures on the rare occasions when they managed to get into full frame.  So even though the models were all impressive, the player could never be quite that sure about the appearances of the few human characters.  This time, there is no question, as the first things the player sees are Isaac close-up from the side, followed shortly by another character (from a related title) being turned into a necromorph, also close-up in frame, which is meant to be both shocking and disturbing.

But simple polygons and texture maps are not everything.  What really provides the kind of visual atmosphere the game requires is the lighting.  One place where many modern generation games have furthered is dynamic lighting: multiple lightsources, usually moving, capable of casting shadows of varying degrees across multiple surfaces.  Some games do it well, but Dead Space 2 does it phenomenally.  Every area, no matter how intricate or simple, contains large numbers of lights of varying colors and intensity.  Many areas are dark, with a small number in spots designed to let the player see just enough to know something is there, and not much else.

What sets the Sprawl further apart is the sets themselves.  While the Ishimura did include some some sections in the crew quarters, most of the areas were utilitarian industrial corridors and complexes.  Though they did have some special touches, they could become rather samey as they went on.  While the Sprawl does have its own industrial sections, there is a greater variety areas.  The developers pull no punches by putting Isaac in civilian areas straight away after the opening section.  Areas that look old, lived in, and fragile compared to the Ishimura.  Areas that include family apartments, shopping areas, a rather unsettling trip through a children’s school and a Unitology Church (that looks largely untouched by most of the chaos).

But all the graphics in the world would not mean anything without sound and music to go along with it.  Again, like the original, Dead Space 2 has probably the best 5.1 directional audio mixing of anything this reviewer has ever played.  Necromorphs howl and roar in the background, always making the player feel uneasy, though the beginnings of the more bombastic cues that signal actual attacks can be a little obvious at times.

When there are no enemies around, every sound is there to accentuate the quiet.  The fact that this is a place where there should be alot of noise from all the people that live there, and yet those people are no longer there.  Instead in its place are the advertisements, the hum of ventilation and electricity, and even on occasion a children’s toy.  It is all intended to make the player feel uneasy with all the sounds that should be there, but are not.

The voice acting top notch as well.  All of the characters are well written, with very few wallbanger moments.  The big change from Dead Space here is that Isaac is no longer a silent protagonist.  Alot of the story is about Isaac trying to deal with the events on the Ishimura, as well as the guilt over the death of his girlfriend, who was only there do to his insistence.  He is given a significant amount of character development.  While his voice-acting is occasionally a bit flat, but it is obvious that he is trying, and the writers thankfully avoid giving him any witty one-liners.  Everything is played completely straight.

When paired with the graphics, everything just comes together with the atmosphere and style.  That hallway is just a little darker, the flashlight does not illuminate far enough.  Was that a necromorph skittering across that doorway, or is that howling close or far away?  You know you saw something there, behind the crates, almost cackling as it peeks out, before another screams and rushes from the opposite direction you never expected.

The controls are largely the same from Dead Space, and those are themselves a modern generation refinement of the Resident Evil 4 control scheme.  Players have full control of  movement and camera.  Regardless of movement or not, pressing the key to aim the weapon immediately faces the player in the direction of the camera, with only a loss in movement speed, instead of being rooted in place.  Players can switch weapons, pull up the inventory quickly, though inventory management is lessened here than previous.  The 3d map has been removed in favor of the objective marker also showing paths to the nearest shops and save stations.  All of the game’s HUD elements exist within the world somewhere, instead of on the player’s screen, from health to ammo.  Even the inventory and communications are represented as holograms that appear within the game world instead of simply on the screen.

The Kinesis ability is still a glorified Gravity Gun, but its ability to throw weapon-like objects is emphasised early on, as most players do not seem to have thought of it in the original game.  An early section even requires the player to survive a small attack with nothing but Kinesis and  some rod-like objects.  The Stasis ability, at first, seems to be only semi-useful, but becomes more useful as the game goes on, as it now splashes to hit multiple objects instead of just what it actually hits.  As well, Stasis now automatically regenerates, the timer can be upgraded, but the initial timer is rather long.

One rather noticeable, though welcome change, is that the game actually plays faster.  Its not terribly noticeable at first.  Here, Isaac simply moves faster in every way.  Walking and running no longer feel plodding, and the difference in setting gives his movement a different weighteness.  The melee attacks are even faster, and that is definitely helpful.  The basic melee swing is faster, and no longer has the tendency to clip into and be blocked by scenery.  The curbstomp happens faster and now moves Isaac forward instead of standing in place, as proper distance to use it is not always easy to judge, and it can be chained together quickly.

More weapons have been added to the mix as well.  While the trusty Plasma Cutter is still the go-to weapon in a pinch, the returning weapons are more useful.  The new weapons also have a more real weapon feel, as opposed to the improvised tools-as-weapons approach of the original.  Also, the Flamethrower is no longer useless before upgrading.

If there is anything that can be said about Dead Space 2, it is that it is one of those few sequels that improves on original without doing anything worse than the original.  It is an incredible audio and visual presentation in equal respects.  Dead Space 2 is a phenomenal addition to this relatively new franchise, as well as to the collection of any gamer that likes Resident Evil 4 style survival-horror/action games.

Score: 10/10

Pros:  Incredible visual design.
Great sound effects, music, and acting.
Well written story.

Cons:  Can potentially get repetitious.
Spawn points for enemies still rather obvious.

Weird:  There’s a reason I refer to Resident Evil 4, and not Resident Evil 5
Not demonic babies, but rather “exploding” babies.  Literally.
You made me go to a Unitology Church and back the Ishimura.  Visceral, you guys are fucking bastards. :P
This is really my kind of horror game, so it was very effective for me.
Seriously though, this is the first true GotY contendor of the year.

Need For Speed Hot Pursuit Review

Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit is the third game in the NFS series to carry the Hot Pursuit subtitle.  Unlike the other games, which were developed by various internal EA studios, this interation of Hot Pursuit was developed by Criterion Games, best known for the Burnout Series (though studio DICE helped with world building).  As with the other two games in this subset, the emphasis is placed entirely on driving various exotic supercars as either racers or police.  By exotic supercars, this reviewer means racing specced vehicles from well known manufacturers, most of which only hardcore car nuts will have even heard of.  But they are all licensed real world vehicles.  Point of fact, the game’s tagline is  "All the cars you dreamed of driving, in the way you dreamed of driving them."  The Racer vehicles are available in most of their real world paint schemes, while the Police variants have Police specific paint, sirens and lights, and other equipment.

The events and progression is split between Racer and Police campaigns.  Racer events are the typical arcade style events of Racing and Time Trials, both standard styles and against AI controlled Police.  Playing as the police takes those events and turns them slightly on their ear.  Racing becomes around stopping them, while Time Trials have an added amount of precision, with penalties for sloppy driving.  

NFS:HP is not a simulation game in any way, but since it is using real world vehicles, it is not entirely an arcade affair, like Criterion’s previous title, Burnout Paradise.  The emphasis is on driving the cars fast and completing the objective.  As such, there is no vehicle performance tweaking, nor any paint, emblem, and decal editting, or even any cosmetic after-market parts.  Paint colors are limited to white and blue/green for Police, and manufacturer available colors for the Racers, which are different for every vehicle.  With the nature of the game’s progression, players will be changing vehicles often until they are all unlocked, so no tweaking is okay, but allowing players to make universally appliable custom paint and decal skins, at least on the Racer side, would be nice.

How does it play though?  Very similar to the events in Burnout Paradise.   The vehicles start off very light on the control, but become much tighter as the vehicle specs increase.  Tighter controls are needed to control them at higher speeds, though they end up a bit squirrely during acceleration.  Drifting comes into play as the best way for making tight turns, shortcuts allow multiple paths that are not always actually shorter.  All cars have Nitrous systems, with filling it coming primarily from drifting, drafting (called slipstreaming), and driving dangerously.  The nitrous is incredibly important for quickly accelerating to speed after turns and crash resets, regardless of vehicle.  Basic controls are responsive, and require a fair amount of skill to be successful.

If there was any problem with NFS, it is the same problem most other racing games seem to have, and that is rubberbanding AI.  The player is never really allowed an opportunity to get and stay ahead of the competition by any significant margin, while making nearly impossible to catch up should the player get very far behind.  It is incredibly annoying, on the Racer side, to be far ahead of a pursuing Police car only to have it suddenly burst ahead, faster than the vehicle is capable of, so that it can drop a Spike Strip in front of the player.

To help set NFS apart from other arcade style underground racing games, Criterion added in special equipment.  The core takedown (ramming) mechanic from Burnout and the other Hot Pursuit titles returns.  In some missions that include both Racers and Police, the players are outfitted with up to 4 special weapons to aid in event completion.  These include Spike Strips and EMP launchers.  Additionally, the Racers receive Radar Jammers and Turbo Boosters, while the Police receive Roadblocks and Helicopters.  They all add a dynamic element to the races where they are included.  Limited uses and recharge times keep them from becoming overpowered, as the limited number of uses will usually not even be enough, thus requiring ramming and skillful driving, especially in the later events.  The AI is aggressive and tenacious in any case, able to use the same equipment as well as actively try to dodge it.

Graphically, NFS is impressive.  While the models are not as impressive as the premium models in other recent games, they are more than good enough.  These are the world’s hottest cars looking their absolute best.  Where the cars do not look their best is during crashes.  One of the downsides of using licensed vehicles for game such as this is that the manufacturers do not want them looking bad at any time, while the nature of the game requires it.  It appears that the concession made was that Criterion was allowed to show damage, just not realistic damage modelling.  As such the damage model is the same on every car:  paint scratching, broken windows, and a hanging bumper.  The lighting effects are good as well, headlights and Police lights are dynamic, reflecting off all close objects, from cars to the environments.  The world itself, the city-less Seacrest County, is nice, but rather boring.  There is technically more roadway than in Criterion’s previous game, but without the city or possibility of non-shortcut branching paths, the player will have seen the entire map by the time they are halfway through either campaign, and some areas are repeated in events more often than others too.

The cars all sound impressive, though this reviewer is unsure how close to the actual vehicles they sound like.  Tires one pavement and off-road are different, Police sirens have an authentic wail to them as well.  Hits and crashes have a satisfying crunch to them as well.  The only downside is the soundtrack.  It is almost entirely licensed music, none of which are all that memorable, except maybe “Edge of the Earth” by “30 Seconds to Mars”, and then only because it is used on the title screen, everything else is largely drowned out by the car and siren sounds, at default volume and viewpoint settings.

Probably the big change from previous NFS games is the Autolog.  As with many things, Criterion has learned from their work on Burnout Paradise, in this case the online functionality.    NFS has no free-roaming in terms of finding and starting events, they cannot do quick, drop-in/drop-out play,  What they can do is bring other aspects in, namely the syncing of event  results, rank progress, screenshots, and comments between friends lists, as well as making it easy to add people to the friends list.  Basically, for every event completed, the best times and scores for that event are posted both to the standard online leaderboards, and a friends leaderboard that is always displayed on the event select screen.  In Autolog messages are sent when one player beats another’s time/score, and comments can be posted on them.  The idea is supposed to be along the lines of an ingame Facebook.

There is also online play.  Game types include all Racer races, and various Racer vs. Police types.  This reviewer has not played any of the online modes, and is unable to properly write about them.

All in all, Need For Speed:  Hot Pursuit is an excellent  game.  It offers great arcade style racing with top notch visuals and an incredible sense of speed.  It is a great counterpoint to the more simulation based Gran Turismo and Forza series.  If arcade style racing games are your forte, this is a recommended buy.

Score:  9/10

Pros:
Large collection of the world’s fastest cars
Autolog keeps players in competition with their friends
Great sense of speed

Cons:
Rubberbanding AI
Limited environment

Assassin's Creed Brotherhood

A slightly modified version of this was originally posted here on 11/26/10, this is the original text as written.

Assassins Creed Brotherhood is a direct followup to 2009’s Assassins Creed II.  The story follows Desmond Miles, heir to the assassin legacy, as he further experiences the life of his ancestor, Ezio Auditore, literally picking up the story with the closing scene of ACII.  In a combination tutorial and Metroidvania style “abilitease”, Ezio escapes the Vactican and returns to his family’s villa, days before it is attacked and destroyed by the Papal Armies under the command of Borgia family (this is early enough in the game that it is not a spoiler).  Following the attack, Ezio escapes to Rome to take his revenge.  Meanwhile, in the real world, Desmond and co. are forced to move their operations to the now ruined Auditore villa.

Now, ACB is a direct sequel to ACII, but seeing as it does not follow a new lead character or take place in a different historical era, it isn’t really a full continuation of the AC story as much as it is an intermediary, inbetween story that, supposedly, will lead better into ACIII than simply going from ACII.  But that’s okay in this case, as there is so much here that it cannot be written off as a simple side story.  The writing is strong, the VAs from ACII reprise their roles, continuing to provide strong acting alongside the handful of new characters, including primary antagonist Cesare Borgia.  The accents in the English track continue to be believable, with the included Italian phrases helping add further authenticity to the acting.  Make no mistake, name and numbering aside, this is a necessary story in the greater overall plot of the franchise.  My only problem is a personal one, as this is effectively the end of Ezio’s story, and he was a great character.

If ACB is about anything besides the story, it is 1) the refinement of ACII in preparation for ACIII, and 2) the mulitplayer.

As for the refinement of the formula, the simplest way to explain it is this: if you (the reader) like ACII, you will like ACB.  Every refinement ACII made from AC, as well as every additional thing ACII added are here, and refined to make everything cleaner, easier, and more streamlined.  While the Auditore villa is gone, the city of Rome is essentially the new villa, and is the size of probably two of ACII’s cities mashed together.  Systems for buying and upgrading the shops are in place and are actively, there are just more of them, though you no longer have to return to central place to collect the rent, instead being able to go to the nearest bank.  ACB however contains the previous game’s problem of artificially blocking off portions of the map until certain plot events happen, keeping the player from fully exploring the world early on, if they feel like it.

The vistas are still sweeping and impressive, and the city itself contains and interesting mix of Renaissance era buildings and Roman era ruins existing in the same space.  While the graphics did seem to be a bit better than ACII, the clipping and mip-mapping plane was incredibly obvious to me at times.  To keep the city from getting too boring, the crypts make a return, but now with some additional elements beyond being simple platforming challenges, as well as several side missions have Ezio travelling to destroy warmachines created from Leonardo da Vinci’s designs, or remembering the woman he left behind in Florence (which ties into the beginning of ACII).

Combat is still based around counterattacking, but it was rebalanced to make doing them more effective.  Ezio is now able to perform chain-kills after a successful counter in a way not disimilar from Batman:  Arkham Asylum.  Enemies seem to be less difficult, with the new chaining mechanic further lowering it, and this is usually offset by the game throwing larger numbers of enemies at you.  Free-running still feels generally the same, it works but still occasionally seems slow and sometimes camera angles get in the way of making proper jumps, usually involving jumps at weird angles.

The biggest new addition to the single player is the addition of the Assassins themselves.  After a certain point in the story, Ezio is able to save civilians from enemy troops and then train them as assassins.  The training takes place as a sort of management minigame where you send the recruits on missions to gain experience and level up.  Why is it important?  Because when they are not on missions, the recruits can be called in at almost any time to take out enemy troops, appearing from shadows, hay bales, and out of sight ledges to attack.  The higher level of the recruits, the better their equipment and the more likely they can survive during combat.  With enough recruits ready at once, they can even launch a crossbow attack, killing all nearby enemies in one fell swoop.  The entire thing adds a great dynamic to the combat, and is pretty cool.

The biggest addition to ACB though, the addition that the game was practically sold on, was the inclusion of online, competitive multiplayer.  For a long time, before the beta test and tradeshows that showed it in progress, the big question was how this would work given AC’s core stealth-based gameplay, which confused even myself.  And actually, they did a good job of translating that very gameplay to a competitve multiplayer mode.

The basic premise is for all modes is Hunter/Prey, where each player hunts down a player, while being the prey for another hunter.  Now this by itself would lend to either rather chaotic killing, or cat-and-mouse hiding, depending largely on how the areas are set up.  The areas in ACB are large, open, and multi-layered, allowing for the same kind of free-running as the main game.  How the game keeps this kind of layout from getting chaotic is the inclusion of NPCs.  Lots and lots of NPCs.  Before a match starts, every player (or party leader) chooses one of the several types of avatars available to play the match as, and NPCs of almost every one of those types, including the ones chosen by each player, populate the map many times over.  The point is to find your prey and avoid your hunter among all of these roaming NPCs.

Scoring is based around being unnoticed, with increased scores for killing in many different ways except being noticed by your prey.  And there are quite a few ways to escape hunters too.  From blending into crowds, throwing smokebombs, hiding in haystacks, and simply outpacing pursuers during a chase.  Added into the mix is another multiplayer advancement structure, where higher levels grant access to different abilities and perks that only serve to make the game more interesting.

I, personally, have had alot of fun with the multiplayer mode.  It is well made, very good looking, and its impressive that the game is running so many AI’s at once, even if they are just simple pathing scripts and animations.  It has a unique style that is different from other games, and requires a skill set different from other games.  The almost requirement for patience is significantly different from the dominating first-person shooters.  In the set of Hunted mode matches I played, a team-based mode where each team takes a turn being the hunters and prey, the opposing team would equal the number of kills of my team, but lose because they don’t know how to be subtle, thus having low scoring kills.  While the abilities and perks do not cause any significant changes to the core strategies, the minor variations they allow keep things from becoming completely stale.

The downside though, is that when the kills start, things can go downhill in a matter of seconds.  With the hunter/prey style, many times one player will kill their target, only to get noticed by their hunter and killed, and so on, forcing several players to respawn very quickly.  As well, while prey cannot kill their hunters, they can stun them, but stunning them is often difficult, given the placement requirements, though I have seen some players who were proactive with stunning.  And above all, that same playstyle difference that makes the multiplayer unique will probably also keep it from staying popular in the long term, unless there is alot of DLC released on a regular schedule.  This isn’t like BioShock 2’s mulitplayer, which was unneeded, this is something truly outside the norm and can become even better with a few interations.

The bottom line is this, never mind AC, if you like ACII, you will like this.  Everything about ACII has been refined and improved, and the curious addition of multiplayer is a welcome change from the volume of military shooters out there.  I wholly recommend it.

Score:  9/10

Pros:
Training up Assassins is fun, and watching NPCs do what you do is badass.
Continued great storytelling and acting.
Multiplayer is interesting and different from most other things out there.

Cons:
Multiplayer, while good, is not for everyone.
Load times are long, even longer if the game isn’t installed on the hard drive.
Minor control issues from previous entries remain, namely camera angles causing missed jumps and reduced combat awareness.

Vanquish Review

A slightly modified version of this was originally posted at http://wegotthiscovered.com/2010/11/04/vanquish-review/ on 11/4/2010.

There was a moment early in the game when I realized that Vanquish was not just a standard third person shooter.  That could have been when the Argus robot broke through the ground into the area, but that, technically, happened during a cutscene.  No, this was later in the chapter, when a ship crashed into the battlefield.  It may have been scripted, but literally crashed into the stage.  The sheer spectacle of Vanquish starts early, and doesn’t let up.

Vanquish was made by Platinum games and masterminded by Shinji Mikami (of Devil May Cry, Resident Evil, etc.).  I say masterminded because Vanquish is Shinji Mikami’s attempt to created a game caters to the Western market, while still managing to be undeniably over the top and Japanese.  Some parts even get as far as being downright insane.  The ship crash is one of the lesser events to happen.

In Vanquish ,Russian nationalists take over an American space colony, using the energy transmission system it contains to wipe out San Francisco, and threatening to do the same to New York should the US not surrender.  You play Sam Gideon, an engineer for DARPA, and lead tester for the ARS (Augmented Reaction Suit).  When the military launches a counterattack, DARPA sends Sam to rescue the developer of the ARS and colony transmission system, covering it up with the excuse of testing the suit in actual combat.

Really, the story is rather meaningless, doing nothing more than setting the stage for the long string of set pieces that make up Vanquish’s gameplay.  There is a bit of a plot-twist near the end of the game, but it comes so far out of left field that its very much a “huh?” moment, as well as the obligatory sequel hook, of course.  The ingame dialogue that moves the game along is rather bad too.  At least the VAs seem to understand that, with veteran VA Steve Blum (Cowboy Bebop, Samurai Champloo) hamming it up as the ultra-gravelly voiced Sergeant Burns.  I am unable to find a full voice cast for some reason, but Sam himself is voiced by relative unknown Gideon Emery, also speaking in full gravel mode.  Ellen Ivanova sounds familiar, but I can’t place the actress offhand.

A cover based third-person shooter, Vanquish pulls its primary inspiration from Gears of War, with a healthy addition of Devil May Cry speed and style, with homages to other lesser known games.  The basic gameplay is the  same as Gears, players run around a battlefield, taking cover behind various objects, mostly conveniently placed waist-high walls to avoid enemy fire, popping out to shoot at enemies.  Sam, however, is sleeker and more mobile than his Gears counterparts.  There are not a huge number of enemy types, so the majority of differentiation is in enemy equipment and numbers.  The encounter design is built around using certain enemy types in limited spaces to make things more challenging.

Where it differentiates itself is with AR mode, and the “slide”.  AR mode can be best described as bullet-time.  When activated, it slows down time for the player, allowing them to better tune their shooting, or getting out of danger.  The slide, with a press of a button, Sam activates jets in the ARS’s legs to do what can best be described as a “rockstar slide”, propelling him around the battlefield at speeds that make the roadie run look like a snail crawling backwards.  What the combination of both of these systems does is allow the player to be significantly more mobile.  So mobile in fact, that a skilled enough player doesn’t actually need to play this cover as a cover based shooter.  The slide serves several gameplay functions as nearly every other function can be followed through after it.  It can be used to escape danger, dodge enemy fire, and move quickly into cover or melee range.  It allows for a game that is faster paced than other third person shooters, and everything feels incredibly tight.  Those tight controls are needed because the action sequences always very intense.  Even the first firefight after the opening cinema is visually overwhelming, the player needing time to simply adjust to everything that they’re seeing.

Everything works the way its supposed to, but there one of the related design choices serves to put a bit of a wrench in Vanquish’s usually frantic pace.  That choice would be the heat gauge.  Those three functions:  AR Mode, sliding, and melee are all connected to this meter.  AR mode and sliding both drain the gauge at a constant rate, while a successful melee attack drains it completely.  When the gauge is completely empty, it ends up taking several seconds to completely recharge, leaving the player without any of those abilities, almost requiring the player to take cover until it recharges.  Even more so, when Sam takes too much damage, AR Mode is automatically activated to allow the player an opportunity to take out the enemies and/or find cover, and there isn’t any way to end this manually, the player has to wait for the gauge to deplete.  While it isn’t an insurmountable problem, it often breaks the game flow, forcing the player to slow down, or even stop, during sections that are often frantic and overwhelming.  It also leads to many extra deaths due to AR sometimes not being available when its needed.

The other place Vanquish shows off is in the overall visual style.  Going hard into the near future setting, the inside of the colony itself shows off stark white building-scapes, accented by harsh lighting, and of course lots of explosions.  The enemies are robots, usually appearing in a shiny red, the majority of them being reminiscent of Mass Effect’s Geth, with a separate type being the more bruiser type.  Boss take several forms, from massive transforming quad-leg tanks to a veritable junk-robot (more effective than one might think).  There aren’t many enemy types, but I don’t really hold it against Vanquish, as many other shooters had limited types.  The character models are well made, especially the stylized faces, and they need to be since they’re often shown during the cut scenes.  The ARS that Sam wears, that is definitely one of these most impressive things in the entire game, all white with black trim, lots of interlocking pieces, and a sweet helmet that folds open whenever Sam needs to take a smoke (which is often).  While the overall background doesn’t change throughout, the spectacle of looking at the inside of the space colony is very impressive.

The cityscapes are stark and sterile, it ends up being the battles that add that gritty feeling that all other shooters have.  Unfortunately, aside from specific objects, usually cover points, the battlefields themselves are not interactive.  The setting’s artificiality is especially on display during a section in the late game where Sam passes through a park area, and all the foliage looks unnatural.  As well, the onscreen UI is functional, but rather ugly, and ends up taking up a lot of the right side of the screen.  Many times the player is likely to take deaths because there they simply do not have as much situational awareness as they should.

If there’s anything holding Vanquish back, it’s the selfsame style that gives it most of its character.  It’s a Japanese game trying to emulate American games.  It gets the core gameplay right, and adds on it to make things fresh, but most of the design screams of the old “this is what Japan thinks Americans want” notion.  Vanquish is more successful at it than most, but it still can’t get away from that feeling of being a Japanese game.  Sam and Burns are the biggest examples, playing off the bulky Space Marine aesthetic, but going over the top with it.  Burns is too big to be realistic, with as little actual armor as he wears.  Sam is the badass former College athlete, scientist, engineer, and world class cigar chomper.  How does that make sense?  The words “shit” and “fuck” are thrown around with almost reckless abandon, often at least somewhat out of context.  As well, Vanquish can be rather short, potentially as short as 4 hours, on the lowest difficulty, though a highscore system was added, potentially as means to add replay ability.  There is no multiplayer, but I don’t consider that a negative.  Vanquishes  primary gameplay conceits, slide and bullet-time, would not work in a competitive game.

My opinion, Vanquishes good aspects outweigh the bad, and I consider it a buy.  The gameplay is fast and furious, emphasizing a more active role in combat.  The story may be nonsensical, but it doesn’t really have to make sense.  Aside from the length, the only thing that I can see people having an issue with is the over the top Japanese styling.  Given the genre, third person shooter, this can be rather off putting.  Not to me, but others might, so my suggestion is to play the demo first.  If you like it, then you should like the full game.

Score:  9/10

Pros:  Fast gameplay
Great graphics
Slide and bullet time make it feel different from other third person shooters
Incredible set pieces

Cons:  Nonsensical story
Short
Heat gauge can break game flow
Might be too over the top for some players

Super Meat Boy Review

A slightly modified version of this review was originally posted here ( http://wegotthiscovered.com/2010/10/28/super-meat-boy-review/ ) on 10/28/2010.

Super Meat Boy is remake/pseudo-sequel to Meat Boy, an indie-game that was featured on Newgrounds and gained enough of a following to get the XBLA and WiiWare game.  And it’s one hell of a game.

Super Meat Boy is the story of Meat Boy, Bandage Girl, and Doctor Fetus.  Bandage Girl loves Meat Boy, he and her.  But Doctor Fetus, know one likes him, and he hates you.  Not just you as Meat Boy, but you, the player.  And so beats Meat Boy up and steals Bandage Girl, so its up to Meat Boy, and you controlling him, to save her from Doctor Fetus’ clutches, and remember that Doctor Fetus hates you.  That’s the story in a nutshell, it doesn’t get anymore complicated because it doesn’t need to.

To put it simply, Super Meat Boy is a 2d side-scrolling platformer.  But that’s selling the game short.  Super Meat Boy isn’t simply a platformer, rather, it’s a throwback to the old days of hardcore, hard as balls NES platforming games of the ‘80s.  This is game that is pure platforming at its core, and nothing gets in the way of it.

So what does a platformer need to be successful?  Controls and level design.  Controls are the most important part of games of this type.  If it doesn’t control well, the entire thing falls apart.  If the levels are dull, then it doesn’t matter how well it controls, since the game wouldn’t be making good use of them.  Well SMB has them both in spades.  Meat Boy controls perfectly, running, jumping, wall-jumping.  He can run, stop on a dime, and bounce back and forth between walls with absolute precision.  That’s where the stages come in.  After a few stages to help the player learn the controls, the difficultly starts ramping up, each stage giving the player a new challenge with which to test their skills.  From buzz saws to moving grinders and beds of spikes.  And that’s just the first world, the second brings in cascades of spikes, allowing them the developers to put them anywhere, and the third world has missile launchers.  And that is just the kinds of things in the stages, not how the stages are actually set up to challenge you.

What makes it interesting is how those things are used.  I know its hard to imagine with just words (indeed, it might be better to watch a youtube video of SMB in action), but imagine a stage where you have to run to the edge of a platform and long jump onto a wall, wall-jump between two walls several times, followed by a jump between two close set saw blades onto another wall and time your wall-jumps so as to not hit the saw blade that’s moving along the now opposite wall.  And consider that all of that will probably happen over the course of maybe 5 seconds, and that is, within this game, a very simple challenge.  The controls let you get through this, and many harder challenges with precision.  To put it simply, this game is pure skill, and if you fail (and you will), then it’s entirely your fault (or maybe the sweaty controller), and the game gets you back in the action very quickly, usually within one or two seconds.  One of the fun little features at the end of each stage is that it shows a replay of the stage with every single life you used up on it, all playing at once, and is pretty wild.  Each world also has a “boss” stage, which typically presents a unique challenge in itself.

Stylistically, keeping true to the 8-bit and 16-bit inspiration, SMB was definitely made in very clean, very simple style that almost looks like it could be played on an NES or SNES.  Meat Boy himself is a simple red block with eyes and a mouth, kicking up meaty blood as he runs, and leaving trails of meaty blood on  on any surfaces he touches.  All the stages seem to have a bit of a tile-set set look, but again, its in service to the throwback style.  As well, each world has its own visual style, from earthy in the first world, to industrial in the third.  Some of the persistant obstacles (the ones that aren’t world specific) have world specific visual styles.  The basic spike trap looks like saws, hypodermic needles, salt, and actual spikes, depending on the world.  As well, some stages change the style and present them in monochrome, its very striking.

Music is good.  Each world has its own general theme, with variations of volume and tempo to keep it from getting too repetitive.  Sound effects, well, Meat Boy is made of meat, and he’s pretty squishy, and it sounds like it when he runs and jumps.

One of the big things about Super Meat Boy though, is the non required, and bonus content.  Each of the seven worlds has 20 stages plus a boss stage, which must be played to complete the main game.  But each world has more than that, if you look for them.  Complete any stage under the target time earns the A+ rank, and opens up a “Dark World” version of the stage, which is harder.  Each world also has several warp zones that lead to sets of stages that are supposedly easier than the main stages, but you only have 3 lives to complete each of the three stages in the set.  All of these special stages has their own style as well, going further into homage territory by going complete 16-bit SNES, 8-bit NES, or even full on monochrome Gameboy style with the visuals and sound.

Some of these warps take you to a special set of stages where completion unlocks a new character. Each world (spread between all Light, Dark, and Warp stages) contains 20 bandages, which are collected to also unlock bonus characters.  That’s the big thing, all of the unlockable characters are from other indie-games out there, including, but not limited to, Commander Video  (of bit.trip series), Tim (of Braid), and The Guy (of I Wanna Be The Guy), each with their own speed and jump power, as well as special ability.  And they need to be used for any of those people going for 100% completion.  Meat Boy can complete every stage in the game, but he can’t obtain every bandage or make it to every warp by himself.

Final recommendation, buy it, with a caveat.  Super Meat Boy is not for everyone.  Not everyone can handle the difficulty of a game like this, which I’ve heard described as “masocore” (combination of masochist and hardcore).  So try the demo before buying.  If you don’t like it, don’t buy.  If you do, then Super Meat Boy is a hardcore platformer that will make you throw a fit, shout expletives, and make you want to throw your controller, and then you successfully complete a stage and will be thanking god for it.  Then you will move onto the next stage and the challenge it offers, and happily start the cycle again.

Pros:
-I LOVE THIS GAME!
-Great level design
-Solid controls
-Lot of game for the price

Cons:
-I HATE THIS GAME!
-Painful level design (not really con so much as just what SMB is supposed to be)
-Not for everyone

Random Thoughts:
-Doctor Fetus is a dick.
-The world 4 boss is made of your death, you’ll know what I mean when you see it.
-Poor squirrel…

Final Score:  9/10

Front Mission Online review

Extra Disclosure:  A slightly modified version of this review (which I did write) was posted here  on 10/23.  This is the original, unmodified text.  Enjoy.  :)



Full disclosure:  This review is based on the Xbox 360 version of the game, played on a 720p LCD television (component video) and 5.1 stereo (optical audio).  The reviewer’s Xbox 360 is a launch Elite unit that has RRODed once.

Front Mission Evolved was released in September for the Xbox 360, Playstation 3, and PC.  It was developed by Double Helix (known primarily for licensed titles), and published by Square-Enix.  The most recent addition in the Front Mission series, and breaks the series tradition as a tactical strategy RPG, instead coming out as a third-person shooter.

Story:

Front Mission Evolved is set in a future Earth that is divided by politics and warfare.  Taking place decades after other entries in the series, the nations have expanded into space using orbital elevators and networks of satellites, an uneasy truce stands between the nations until an unknown group attacks New York city and destroys the orbital elevator.  The story follows Dylan Ramsey, an engineer and wanzer test-pilot, during the attack as he tries to find his father, a scientist who disappeared in the attack.  Shortly after he is drafted into the military and joins in the battle against a terrorist force bent on making peace in the world, preferably by force.

To be completely honest, the story, while smarter and more mature than average, is still every kind of sci-fi fluff gamers and otaku have come to expect from Japanese writing.  Though it is nice that they tried to put in a Kojima-esque plot twist near the end, it really doesn’t seem to be much more than a justification for a piece of plot that is preposterous within the context of the story.  Front Mission has always been about the politics, and this story forgets about it halfway through.

Gameplay:

Front Mission’s combat takes place primarily with mechs called Wanzers (from the German “Wanderpanzer”, meaning “walking tank”), with a few short sections taking place on foot.  This action takes places as a third-person shooter, skewing the standard over-the-shoulder perspective for over-the-head, switching to over-the-shoulder during the on-foot missions.

What sets the gameplay apart from other shooters is the wanzers.  While the idea of giant mechs are generally unrealistic, the wanzers themselves are more realistically built than most other mechs found in anime and games.  Rather than being fast and fragile, the wanzers, true to their name, are big lumbering machines that won’t go down fast or easily.  Wanzers can “skate” around areas quickly.  The wanzers are customizable with modular parts, body, arms, and legs that can be switched out between missions into almost any configuration.  This allows players many options for how they outfit their wanzer.  Each part has its own health, and destroying each does something different: legs lower movement speed and restrict boost time, while arms lower accuracy.

The combat is where Front Mission Evolved shines.  As stated earlier, these are not the standard anime mechs.  They look and control like big, heavy machines.  The steps are small and slow while the skate lets the wanzer move around quickly while the energy gauge has energy, allowing the player to be more mobile by moving into melee position, or dodging incoming attacks.   Up to four weapons of various types can be equipped, from machine guns to missiles and (brass) knuckles, and all of them are at their fingertips, with hand weapons on the shoulder triggers, shoulder weapons on the bumpers.  While movement speed can be slow, turning and aiming is fast and responsive, with a limited amount of aim-assist, and all weapons except melee can be fired independently and simultaneously with the other weapons.

Encounters are designed around enclosed areas with many obstacles to dodge around.  The only real issue is there are very few types of enemies, which are upgraded as the game progresses to match the improved weaponry and parts the player receives.  The AI, while smart enough to dodge behind obstacles themselves, are not that intelligent, having only really one AI script based on their type.  Brawlers melee, Snipers snipe, Assaults shoot from ranges based on their weight class.  Just like your wanzer, enemy units can have their arms and legs damaged, while destroying the body destroys them mech.  Despite the limited enemy types and AI, all the fun is in the large scale battles with loads of bullets and missiles coming at you and your AI teammates.

One downfall is the handful of boss encounters.  While the normal encounters take place in varied environments against large groups of enemies, the boss encounters take place in open, static arenas against single enemies.  With two exceptions, these battles are against other wanzers that completely break the rules the game sets for the construction of wanzers.  The use parts that are unavailable to the player, loadouts that are too heavy for all but the heaviest unit the player could build, the parts can’t be destroyed, and their armor is absurdly high.  The bosses have no AI, instead being pattern based.  The fights devolve into battles of attrition, the player moving between armor and ammo pickups in order to survive.  Only the mid and end boss try something different, with encounters against large machines that don‘t need to meet the rules.  They provide situations that the other bosses can’t hope to provide, and the game would have been better with more encounters like these.

The other downfall is the on foot missions.  They work, but they’re not good.  They’re meant to tell portions of the story where the characters can’t use their wanzers.  The game changes to a simple Gears of War wannabe that gets the basic functions right, but provides none of speed, excitement, or variety of the games it tries to be, or even the wanzer portions of the game.  The areas are not interesting to fight in, and there are only 3 enemies and weapons.  It’s fuctional and nothing more.  Thankfully they’re only three of these sections, and they’re short.

Sound:

There really isn’t much to say here.  Either there’s something wrong with my sound system (not likely, movies always play properly), but it has long been my belief that most developers are terrible at implementing 5.1 audio mixes into their games.  Directional sound effects are good, but any music and voice-over work that does not come from a definite source are typically drowned out.  The music is not always much of a loss, but developers need to learn to play directionless voice-over through the center channel.  Thankfully, Double Helix has managed to learn that.  Now if only the writing was better, because the actual voice-overs range in quality from relatively good, to pretty cheesy.  At least none of them are flat.

But the explosions, oh boy.  They look big on the screen, and they sound big on the speakers  While not always original, the sound effects are loud and appropriate for the weapons.  The wanzers seem to have stolen all of their movements sounds from the live-action Transformers movies, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing, though you’d think big machines would be louder.

Online:

Front Mission features online play in the form competitive multiplayer.  The modes are Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Conquest, and King of the Hill modes.  The  customization aspect is brought in, allowing for a wide range of potential wanzers.

This is where my primary beef with the game lies.  Multiplayer represents the game’s best aspects combined with technical issues that left this reviewer in a controller chucking mood.  The available modes aren’t that interesting, but integrating the wanzer customization turn it into something else entirely.  Playing against the AI is nothing compared to playing against other people.  Matches can be fast and furious.

Provided you can actually get a game.  There’s already an issue that this is a rather niche title, so not all that many people will be playing it online, but that’s not the problem.  The problems lie in the backend.  With such a small player base, matchmaking is practically non-existent.  With all the high ranking players always on the same team against lower ranking players, games that should be evenly matched end up becoming complete bloodbaths.  The unlocks are based on player rank, and are not balanced at all. Higher ranks have a definite advantage regardless of skill, unlike other games where high rankers have more options but skilled low rankers can still be competitive.  Here, low ranked players might be able to occasionally leech a kill or some assist points, but its several ranks before players have access to equipment that is even remotely competitive.  As well, certain weapon combinations and strategies are overpowered, and can’t be easily countered.  Loadouts, whether prebuilt or custom, can’t be changed in match, making it hard to counter some of those unbalanced loadouts.

There is no apparent host priority, no host migration, players can’t join matches in progress, and dropouts can happen quite easily.  But this reviewers most often seen problem is the game’s propensity to freeze.  It happened occasionally during single-player, but not often enough to be anything more than system hiccups.  But something noticed every freeze during multiplayer came when transitioning from game lobby to game, or game to lobby, usually the latter.  Backing up save files is almost needed as the transition loads happen at the same time as the autosave, and can corrupt them.

Conclusion:

I’ll switch to first person here.  Simply put I like this game, but I want to love it.  A lot people like third person shooters, but not everyone likes mech combat games, regardless of form, so this game isn’t for everyone.  But, it has it where it counts, the gameplay, and that’s the part I love.  Guns firing, missiles exploding, wanzers going every which way, and it gets better in multiplayer.  But the technical issues with the multiplayer soured my opinions.  I’ve seen single players dominate entire matches, and even concerted efforts have trouble taking them down.  I personally, am an average player but have ended up the fodder for guys with a shield (shields are overpowered) and rockets multiple times.  The most egregious though was the freezing.  Having to back up save files for any reason other than transporting them shouldn’t be necessary with how ubiquitous autosaving has become, but the autosave also occurs during loading, any loading is where all my freezes have occurred.  I twice lost my single player save file, as well as several ranks worth of XP to freezes when loading into the postgame lobby.

So if you like mech combat games, you can’t really go wrong, because the gameplay itself it absolutely solid.  But with the issues I had, I can’t really recommend it, at least not at full price anyways.  If the online was fixed, or at least less prone to freezing, then I would call this a buy, but I can’t.  Rent it, or buy after discounted, but don’t expect any except the hardcore players to still be playing online at that point.