Skylanders Giants

HI! Oh don't look surprised. It's a game of course I made plans to play it. Anywho. Skylanders Giants came out the other day and I must say I am severely disappointed in the upgrades they made. The original skylanders was a short game to begin with and Giants only has about 16 chapters so at a half hour each taking our time you are looking at eight hours of game play. I don't know about you but $60 game. 8 hours of game play. Not a happy camper.

 Also the main reason I play this game is to play with my man however they have really added insult to injury with the multiplayer mode this time. In the original game the second player was at least allowed to open boxes but not anymore! If a second player gets near a box the primary player has to open it and it has been doing this at random for other challenges such as the feats of strength. It's less like having two players and more like having a side kick.

Next on the bitch list is the difficulty settings. I was excited because I just breezed through the first game murdering everything in my path so when I heard the second had a hard and even nightmare mode I was excited. And then it failed me. Hard didn't make the enemies harder to kill. It didn't even seem to make more of them when we were playing with the different levels. All Hard seems to do is increase the damage of the enemies effectively turning all your own pieces, giants included, into glass cannons.

Then they added potty humour. I don't know about you but I don't like potty humour. It gets old quickly and I know the game is aimed at kids but I wouldn't want my child laughing at these jokes either. I'd want them to have a little more taste so when I see they have a figure coming out called Hot Dog (awww its a puppy) and one of its attacks is a flaming bag of poo I just have to sigh. Or one of our giants has an attack called "B is for butt stinger" I can just imagine a bunch of 6 year olds running around saying that or teaching it to little siblings. I found it to be unnecessary and in poor taste.

Speaking of the giant aspect of the game I was really under impressed. They seem to just be larger, which gets in the way of each other more than anything, with more HP. They don't seem to actually be any stronger. Level 4 Tree Rex currently goes 8 damage with his upgraded blaster power. Not impressed. The enemies I'm fighting do like 80.

Oh and one last point that irked me wrong. The hats. There are TONS more of them. Yea! That's great except you don't find all of them anymore. You find some and others you have to buy in specific levels. Also if you don't buy them in that level you don't get credit for having found them all. So it can easily turn your three star or even two star level back down to a one star because your staring at these hats debating between a star and your next upgrade. I think they were trying to create greater replay value maybe? All it did was bug me. I'd spend five minutes comparing hats then get to the end and be told I didn't find them. BS! I found them! I CHOSE not to buy them.

Corset not really sticking to the new schedule.
Signing off.

ps: At least I'm posting eventually.

L.A. Noire

So let's talk about LA Noire, better yet, lets not. I have never been so turned off by a game in the first five minutes in my entire gaming life. I understand that most games give you a bit of game play to figure out how the world works but at a certain point I expect them to cut the strings and let me go. It was like GTA with railroad tracks going through the middle. It hurt to play.

Maybe I need to explain. I love the Grand Theft Auto series because when they put me behind the wheel of a vehicle they aren't going to auto fail whatever I am doing because I happened to strike a few jay walking pedestrians. In L.A Noire one of the first things they teach me to do is drive the car that has all the maneuverability of the Titanic. Well whatever says I. How much driving could there be? Apparently a lot. I either have to run to where I am going or drive the car. If I hit to many people I fail whatever it is I am doing and yet even with the siren on no one really seems motivated to get out of may way. I had fun testing this when driving at the speed of a steamroller toward a pedestrian in the road. I have to say the most fun I've had with the car is jumping in and letting my partner chase me around the city.

So fine whatever, driving sucks, nothing new here. So I am going along doing my police officer thing when I fail my first interrogation. Oh no! I leave the room my boss chews me out and then I get to start over. Again, again, and again. At no point are there any consequences for failing other than I'm not allowed to skip the cut scenes. I thought this was a fluke so later on I get it right and move on about my life. I decide to catch a random criminal whose decided to run off in the same direction I am going anyway. Oops the guy gets away, whatever. No wait. Now I'm back in the car having to decide if I really wanted to go get him. I once again don't have the option to fail. Lucky me this time I have the option to ignore.

It seems like everything I do in this game turns into some tedious task. I'm playing a game to have fun not do it til I get it right. There are times when I want to fail because I don't want to do things a certain way. Don't imply there will be consequences then say I can't actually chose to take them. It's irritating.

Moving on. As far as looks, the game is pretty. I found Heavy Rain to be prettier but L.A Noire is more cute. They have old fashioned music that really tries to bring you into the world (before game play makes you hate it) and some cut scenes about the guys past that make you feel for the character. Even logging in you get to choose your menu option and it flashes on the wall like a shadow. One thing I found hysterical was that when you get close to a clue you get special music and the remote starts to vibrate but it also gave me the vibe of skill not required. I don't like having my hand held in games. Don't give me a mystery then solve it for me. Once again, it's aggravating.

Now I'm not saying there are no redeeming values in the game I'm just having trouble finding enough of them for me to keep playing. I found the driving to distracting from the game play for me to get very involved. It seems every other moment I'm back in the car or running after someone. Long story short this game doesn't float my boat and will probably be going back to the store as a down payment on one of the games coming out in the near future. We'll see.

Corset moving back to fantasy games,
Signing off.

Heavy Rain: Railroad Edition.

Hey guys. As promised I've been playing Heavy Rain and now I have another short bit to say about it. I feel awfully deceived. I wanted the game because the premise was I would have choices and if I killed a character it would change the plot and choices I made mattered. Well I've been playing the game and have come to the conclusion that it's all a lie. Not in the sense that the cake was a lie, but an actual lie. I was playing and I found if I followed a set of actions Ethan would end up yelling and throwing things at Madison. My response was bad Ethan! It was near a save point so I loaded and then reloaded. I took every possible choice set I was offered and the only thing that changed was how long it took me to get him throwing things. Well Damn says I. So I let the fight happen. Afterwards I am offered the choice to be angry or apologize. First time I chose apologize. Second time I chose be angry which led to an extra speech blurb before being rerouted to apologize. I have to say my primary motivation at this point for continuing to play the game is to see if I can drive my character off the rail road tracks I seem to have found. I don't think I am imagining this but I haven't really heard anyone else complain about it. I have a hard time believing I am the only one who tried to change the outcome of a situation on the spot rather than a do a full blown second play through. I think I am going to start over so I can try and kill/let everyone involved die. Let's see what happens then. And NO I won't just youtube it. Where is the fun in that?

Heavy Rain

Ok despite ALL the PS3 remotes going MIA I bought a new one last night. Since that gives me the ability to start working on the three PS3 games I bought in a 3 for 2 deal I thought I'd post an update. Normally the 360 is my bread and butter but given that two of the three I bought were exclusives and they all had to be on the same system I don't think I came away with a bad deal: Heavy Rain, LA Noire, Batman: Arkham Asylum.

Now I've been playing Heavy Rain for about 3 hours now. I've seen beautiful graphics. An intriguing story. About 4 different perspectives and dialogue I wouldn't believe if I saw it. Now don't get me wrong. Switching characters every ten minutes and sometimes just to put them in a car and drive away dramatically can be a bit irritating and pull you away from the story but at this point I'm intrigued enough where I don't mind. What I do mind is the absolutely awful Dialogue. I mean honestly. At one point I find myself giving a presentation and the character I am playing is speaking calmly flipping slides when all of a sudden he breaks out swearing at a member of the audience who swears back and the two would start fighting if man number 3 didn't step in. This isn't the first time something ridiculous has sprung from a seemingly calm situation. I also don't understand why everyone talks like you just threaten to kill their firstborn son. Everyone is so tense even when it doesn't make sense. Asking your eight year old son if he would like dinner should not use a tone you'd expect if you asked them to disarm a bomb.

I also want to tell them that they are not nearly as mysterious as they think they are. AND the FBI guys glasses and glove get up is completely out of place compared to the rest of the resources available. Though I'll admit having your office on Mars or at the bottom of the ocean is pretty cool.

Anywho I'm withholding full judgement until I finish the game however at this point I've accidentally killed someone (not a main character) had several shouting matches and not let my druggie shoot up and made my kid do all their homework. I think the funnest part of this is I have no idea if I have botched the plot completely of if I'm on my way perfectly.

Guess I'll find out in a few more hours. Once I have a bit more to say I'll come back and update.
Looking for the Origami Killer!
Signing off.