Windows 7: Tribulations And Then Trials

Operating Systems are simply one of those things in modern life that you cannot do without, unless of course you are one of the few people on the planet that never uses a computer (in which case you won’t be reading this anyway!).

Over the years, I have used pretty much every OS for P.C that has has been released, right from the “good old” days of MS-DOS, though Windows 95/98, Windows ME/2000,Windows XP and even Linux on rare occaision, but the one I always seem to return to (unsurprisingly) is Windows XP.

Recently, as kind of an experiment and maybe because I was a bit bored on that given day, I decided to give Windows 7 a whirl to see what all the fuss was about and after hearing how wonderful it was from several friends and colleagues.

Initially, I was quite impressed with the shiny new Microsoft offering, although I wasn’t that impressed with the minimum install size, coming in at a whopping 15 gigabytes. I know that 15gb is small in today’s 21^st century of cheap hard dives with hundreds of gigabytes of storage, but I still think this is a bit of cheek for an OS. The install went very smoothly and after several hours, I was up and running with my new shiny install of Windows 7. If you are a bit of a Windows XP die-hard like me (there are many of us), then initially you may find the Windows 7 interface a bit bewildering as there are quite a few different things. I will not be going into any detail about features here as this is not meant to be a review, but Windows 7 is different and you will probably like it once you get used to the differences from Windows XP.

Now onto the problems that I faced. Admittedly there were not a huge amount of problems, but the ones that I had were enough (for me personally) to give up and go back to Windows XP. For starters, Windows 7 really did not want to play very nicely with both my soundcard and my joystick. I have an old Soundblaster Live Value and an old Microsoft Sidewinder Force-Feedback joystick, both of which worked perfectly well under Windows XP, but were not very happy with this new fangled Windows. There are no “proper” Windows 7 available drivers for the SB Live, but I managed to “sort of” get the soundcard to function with the old Win XP drivers. The only problem was that I could not access Audio HQ at all which meant that the reverb effect was permanently on (annoying for both videos and some games) and the bass and treble settings were set to their lowest value and permanently greyed out, so essentially the sound coming out of my speakers was pretty crap. I also could not get the Creative gameport on the card to initially work until after some faffing around and searching online for a solution. However, I then discovered that Windows 7 just would not detect my MS Sidewinder FF joystick and this took lots more searching and faffing about to get working. I play a lot of flight-sims and I still love my old Sidewinder (it still works perfectly) so I was not too pleased with this.

The final problem with the soundcard came when I tried to get midi working with the gameport under Windows 7. I’m a musician and I use Cubase, but I use one of the old style gameport midi interfaces and again this took a lot of faffing about (and some swearing) to get working correctly. I’m sure some of you out there are probably thinking “why don’t you just get a USB midi interface and a USB joystick?”. Well, it’s true I could do that, but I’m of the opnion that if you have something that you still like to use and it still works perfectly well, then why should you have to upgrade or change it? I know this doesn’t always apply to computer stuff, but I think there are limits and I’m of the opnion that some things should “just bloody work!”

The next problem and probably the final insult came when I tried to play some of the games that I own. I play a LOT of P.C games and quite often I like to revisit older titles in my collection. Now, on the whole, Windows 7 runs the majority of games quite nicely, even older titles and certainly much better than Windows Vista did. However, when you get to older games that use copy protection systems such as Starforce, then the game just often crashes or simply doesn’t run at all. As a couple of examples, I encountered problems with both Rush For Berlin Gold and Hammer & Sickle. With both games, when they said they were installing the Starforce protection drivers and had to reboot the system, I rebooted and tried running the game, but then got the same message again. I did a bit of research online and there was allegedly a way of getting the Starforce drivers to upgrade to the latest version (that should be compatible with Windows 7), but I just could not get this to happen. In the end I was forced to use no CD/DVD hacks just to get the games to run (not good). To be fair, this particular problem is not really Microsoft’s fault, but it was still a deciding factor for me in going back to Windows XP.

Conclusion

In general, Windows 7 is a very good operating system and is certainly a huge improvement over Windows Vista. If you don’t play games at all or even if you are new to P.C gaming and maybe only play the very latest, cutting edge releases, then I can certainly recommend it. The OS is nice to use, is very stable and has some very nice features (I particularly like the desktop gadgets!). However, if like me, you like to play a lot of old games still and you have some older hardware that you really don’t see why you should have to upgrade, then you may want to think twice. Hopefully in time, many of the compatibilty problems can be ironed out, but for me, I think I will just stick with my trusty install of Windows XP, where I know everything works just fine thank you very much!

Metro 2033 PC Review

Metro 2033
PC DVD
Developer: 4A Games
Publisher: THQ
Game website: http://www.metro2033game.com/en

Overview

Metro 2033 is a bit of a grim game. Don’t game me wrong, it’s certainly not a bad game, in fact it is a very good game. However, the overall setting and subject matter tends to make you feel a bit down and in need of something a bit more “fluffy” to cheer yourself up after an extended session with the game (or this could just be me – lol).

The game is based on the novel of the same title, by Russian author Dmitry Glukhovsky and the basic premise is that well used setup of the aftermath of World War 3 and nuclear armageddon, with the player as a character called Artyom who is a kind of “freedom fighter”. The environment is what is left of Moscow, with survivors of the war hiding out in the underground Metro stations. A large part of the game sees you moving though the tunnels and underground areas of the Metro system, going from station to station, with brief sections of the game in the above ground areas of the ruined city.

The stations themselves are on the whole bases for the resistance movement, where you can talk to various characters, the plot progresses and you can buy new weapons and equipment. One cute feature of the game is that the currency of this game world is the actual bullets themselves, with military grade bullets holding more value than regular bullets. The bullets can be traded at various dealers at the stations for various weapons, upgrades and medkits etc. This introduces an interesting game mechanic, as bullets are liberally scattered throughout the game levels, lying on the floor and on dead bodies, but the player has to judge and balance how much ammo they want to spend on supplies and how much ammo they think they may need for the next mission/objective. It’s an interesting system that works quite well and adds an overall tactical layer to what is essentially a very linear first person shooter.

There are other game mechanics that separate this game from being yet another generic FPS and one of them is the use of the gas mask. In certain areas of the game, there is poisonious gas, which will kill you quite quickly within minutes. If you are carrying a gas mask, pressing G puts the gas mask on, but you only have a limited amount of air in the filters. The filters can be replenished either by buying them with bullets at a dealer or finding them on the ground or on dead bodies. As the filters run out, your breathing gets heavier and you will die if you do not replace the filter. You also have a gauge on your left wrist that can be displayed by pressing T and this shows you how much air you have left with the current filter. The gas mask can also be damaged in combat with cracks and marks appearing on the surface, obscuring your view and if it takes too much damage, the mask becomes useless and you need to find a replacement. So in essence this forces you to be constantly aware of the environment and to only use the gas mask when you really need to, to avoid damage during combat, and of course to save your filters and make them last. It’s an excellent mechanic that gives the game more of a “survival-horror” type of feel.

There is also the interesting use of light and your head mounted torch. The game world is beautifully lit and this lends itself well to sections where stealth style gameplay can be employed. Your head mounted torch has, of course a limted batttery charge, but you carry a portable charger, that can be “pumped up” and recharged by bringing up the device by holding down the F key and constantly pressing the left mouse button until the charge gauge is full. When you get the night vision goggles, they are powered by the same battery as your torch and charged by the same charger, so again you are faced with another tactical resource balancing act. The fun is also added to by the fact that enemies (of course) can see and react to your torch beam and you can extinguish many of the light sources (such as oil lamps) that are dotted around the dimly lit tunnels and underground areas. Again this helps make up for the linear nature of the game as in many of the dark areas you have the choice of using sealth or going in “guns blazing” (which quite often gets you killed by the way – lol).

The enemies in Metro 2033 consist intially of mostly mutant creatures that are quite aggressive and a bit scary, but as the game progresses you end up fighting both the Red Army and Neo-Nazis that are battling for control of Moscow. There are also mysterious “ghost” creatures that must be avoided at all cost and I will not go into too much detail here as I don’t want to spoil it for you, but they are quite spooky and certainly add to the survival-horror feel that I mentioned earlier.

As I have mentioned, the game is quite linear, but there is enough variety in the environments and objectives to keep up your interest, with typical sections where you are simply blasting away at enemies, to stealth sections and basic puzzle solving. From a production value point of view, the game is created to a high standard with convincing post-apocalypse underground enivonments, gorgeous lighting effects and well-modelled and animated characters and enemies. The voices on the whole are not too bad (I’ve certainly heard worse), but the monologue from Artyom during the loading screens sounds very dry and boring. Sound effects on the whole are very well done, with suitably scary howls and biting and scratching noises from the mutant creatures and weird and spooky background ambient sounds. The weapon sounds I found to be a bit on the weak side and they could of used a bit more “oompf”, in particular the automatic weapons.

The Good Stuff

Metro 2033 is by no means a groundbreaking game, but it does offer a fun experience. It’s nice to see a developer try to do something a little bit different with the FPS genre and I really like the bullet trading mechanic, the gas mask and the use of lighting combined with the torch/night vision goggles/charger. The atmosphere generated by the the graphics and lighting and the sound and music is probably Metro 2033s’ strongest point as the game will often have you on the edge of your seat and immersed in the action, with the odd shock here and there that will make you jump.

The Bad Stuff

To be honest, there isn’t really a great deal wrong with Metro 2033 in terms of it’s design and playability. If I had to pick one thing, I would question the games replay value. The game is a fairly linear experience and you will find yourself replaying certain sections over and over again as you die for umpteenth time, but some levels do have different paths/approaches that you can take, so they game isn’t completely linear. You also get the obligatory difficulty settings, but I do wonder if many people are likely to play the game through a second time. There is also no multiplayer whatsoever which certainly cuts down on the games overall longevity.

The game does feel a little bit of a lost opportunity as I cannot help feeling that the game world should have been a bit more open. It would have been nice if you could go off and explore the apocalypse torn city of Mosow and it’s underground more and that you could pick and choose your missions from a selection instead of being dragged along a linear plot progression. Unfortunately, this makes Metro 2033 pale in comparison in terms of open world post-apocalypse games such as the excellent Fallout 3 or even Stalker: Shadows of Chernobyl.

Conclusion

All in all, Metro 2033 is a good first person shooter that introduces some different gameplay mechanics and provides some good solid action. The plot is nothing to write home about and you will probably not want to play through it a second time, but if you love FPS games, like a few shocks and scares and you want something that does a few new things, then I can strongly recommend this game. However, as I said in the opening paragraph, it is a bit grim, so you may find yourself wanting to play something like “Critter Crunch” after you get to the finale.

Score: 7 out 10

I'm Back!

Yep, after a long leave of absence from this blog, I'm now back writing once again about the wonderful world of computer games!

"So where did he go and what happened?" I hear you ask (maybe): Well, this being the real world and the real world demands that you earn a living, I was offered a job testing games at a developer, which I did for about six months. Unfortunately this did not leave me very time for writing, so the blog kind of fell by the wayside, which is bad (I know).

Anyway, over the past six months I've had a brief fling with Windows 7 and played a LOT of games. There's also been a bunch of interesting bits and bobs happening in the industry, so there's plenty for me to write and generally moan about.

I will now be contributing to this blog once more on a regular basis, so to coin a phrase "watch this space!"

Operation Flashpoint Dragon Rising: Hands On

Codemasters recently held a press event for both Colin McRae Dirt 2 and Operation Flashpoint Dragon Rising, here in London. I was lucky enough to walk away with a special two mission playable preview disc of the P.C version of Operation Flashpoint Dragon Rising and I will be basing this “hands on” preview on this code.

First of all, a bit of history lesson and a few facts about this new title. For the benefit of maybe some of the younger readers here (and those living under a rock), the original Operation Flashpoint Cold War Crisis, was released way, way back in 2001, developed by Bohemia Interactive. After many patches, upgrades, an expansion pack and a rumoured sequel, Bohemia fell out with Codemasters. Bohemia Interactive then went on to produce the critically acclaimed Armed Assault and more recently, not surprisingly Armed Assault II. With both Armed Assault titles, Bohemia basically produced the spiritual successor to Operation Flashpoint and pretty much was a sequel in everything but name. However, as Codemasters still had the rights to the Operation Flashpoint name and franchise, they decided to produce an official, full on sequel of there own and hey presto, we now have Dragon Rising!

In Dragon Rising, Codemasters once again have the action set on an entirely fictional island, this time around on a place named “Skira”, which sounds more like a planet from Doctor Who, than a fictional island, if you ask me.The island is 220km square in size and the really impressive thing is that this is completely loaded into main memory on both console and P.C versions at mission start. It’s entirely possible to walk your virtual soldier from one end of the island to the other in real time, but this will take you something like 9 hours to achieve. This also offers some stunning views as you can see along the length of the island if you go to a high point on the terrain (and of course you have the graphical detail turned up to max).

The basic scenario setup, is that you play a U.S soldier as part of a U.S force that’s tasked with fighting off a Chinese invasion of the island. The setting is near future as opposed to the 1980’s cold war of the original, so modern, very cool weapons, armoured vehicles and aircraft are employed by both sides. I particularly like the TOW anti-tank missile launcher that has a proper full on loading animation and a devastating effect on armour. This brings me nicely onto the subject of realism and Codemasters are keen to point out that this is a realistic military shooter and not a run of the mill FPS where you play a Rambo type character. On normal setting, the game is very challenging with a few hits normally killing you or your squad mates but you have an onscreen HUD and indicators for how injured you or squad mates are. In hardcore mode, there’s no HUD onscreen at all and the only indication of the state of health for you or the squad is through audio clues of actual physical indicators (i.e. you or the other guys may limp or breath heavy etc when wounded). It’s all very authentic stuff and apparently this is a feature that fans of the original Operation Flashpoint were screaming out for. You also only get one save point at the very start of the missions, so if you mess things up, you need to start over again.

On the P.C preview disc I received, there were two playable missions from the full game. The first one called “Dragon Rising” is kind of a tutorial with hints that pop up during play about the major features such as the orders system or using the medical kit etc. The objectives for this mission are to first destroy the enemy radar and then to take out the enemy SAM launchers. The second mission has the player securing a beachhead and protecting and escorting landing AAVPs (basically amphibious APCs) as they move inland. Both missions gave me a very good indication of how the game actually plays. Right from the off when you load a mission, the game oozes atmosphere, with the screen gradually fading from a blurred effect as radio messages can be heard and there’s lots going on in the form of helicopters buzzing around and the sounds of battle in the distance. The graphics look absolutely stunning and the Ego engine ran just fine even on my modest P.C setup. The terrain of the island of Skira has authentically modelled grass and al sorts of fauna and dense wooded areas. The controls were very intuitive, with standard WASD setup for moving around and mouse look for aiming and looking. All the squad controls are accessed via hitting Q and all the standard, expected orders can be found here. You can also give orders via the real time map. In fact, upon initial play, Dragon Rising does remind me a little of the original Ghost Recon game (not Advance Warfighter, but the very 1^st one!), as it really almost feels like you are a soldier in the thick of things. The missions seem quite dynamic and it’s up to you how you how you approach each objective. The combat system feels very realistic and if you get hit, you slowly bleed to death and if you don’t use the medical kit before the red indicator disappears, the screen fades to grey and you die. This also applies to squad mates if they get hit, so you need to give them first aid in these situations.

Despite the realism, there is one design choice that has me scratching my head at this early stage. The game is very much first person and you cannot go 3^rd person by hitting enter like in Armed Assault. However, when you get in a vehicle, you do not seem to be able to move your head around with the mouse, but you can hit enter and go to a 3^rd person view while in the vehicle. I hope that this aspect is very much work in progress as it’s odd that the realism and immersion is broken with this oversight.

The final game will also feature a full multiplayer game, with all the usual modes, plus the option to play the entire campaign cooperatively with three other people, arranged as a squad. The P.C version will also ship with a fully featured mission editor, where the player can also create missions for the Chinese forces as well as the U.S, so expect to see some very interesting user created content for many months (if not years) after the games release this September.

Velvet Assassin Review

Velvet Assassin
PC DVD
Developer: Replay Studios
Publisher: SouthPeak Games
Game website: http://www.velvetassassin.com/

Overview

Velvet Assassin is stealth based, third person perspective action/adventure set during WW2. You play as beautiful British agent Violette Summer, sent behind German lines on a range of missions to kill key targets, sabotage enemy installations and generally be a real nuisance for the Third Reich. The whole narrative of the game is told as flashbacks, with Violette retelling her exploits from a hospital bed, surrounded by German guards. The set up for each mission is portrayed in a photo album, with each picture animated to show a scene from the upcoming mission. The flashback theme is continued in the actual missions, with Violette recounting key events in the past tense.

In the actual missions, you view Violette from a third person perspective with standard keyboard controls for moving back & forward and strafing left and right. The mouse movement controls turning left and right and moving the camera view up and down. All pretty standard stuff. Violette can jump, but only at set points and she can climb up ladders and onto objects such as crates or boxes. Unfortunately, Violette doesn’t have quite the range of moves of Sam Fisher or even Lara Croft and cannot do things like shimmy along ledges etc. You can put Violette into a crouch by holding down the left ctrl key and then hide in the shadows to avoid the guards. Crouching also makes Violettes movements slower, but quiet, so that she can sneak up behind German guards that have their backs to her. In the bottom right of the screen, there is an icon that depicts the silhouette of our agent and when there is a blue outline, you know that Violette is concealed in darkness and cannot be seen. When Violette is close behind an enemy, the screen darkens, the music changes, and pressing the left mouse button, when prompted, initiates a stealth kill with the knife. This initiates a rather stylised and often grisly set animation of our lovely agent robbing the poor German guard of their life.

Throughout the game, various secondary items, not really related to the missions, can be picked up. These have an experience point value. For every 1000 experience points, Violette gets one upgrade point and you can use this to upgrade a number of her key attributes (i.e. stealth ability, shooting, speed), offering an almost RPG “lite” aspect to the gameplay. Violette can also pickup medkits and morphine shots that are sparsely left around the game maps. With both the medkits and morphine, Violette can only pick these up if her health is low or the morphine meter is not full. If the morphine meter is full, pressing the F key slows the whole game and Violette is suddenly wearing a negligee, the same one that she is wearing in the hospital bed at the start, while recounting her exploits. While in this odd “negligee time” mode, Violette moves quicker than normal, while everything else is slowed down, so for a limited amount of time, she can kill German guards with ease. When the morphine meter runs out, everything is back to normal, but you cannot initiate the mode again until the morphine is replenished by finding another pickup of the stuff. This offers a certain tactical element to the game, as you have to be careful about when exactly you use this mode. Likewise, you have a pistol with a silencer that is quicker and generally more efficient at dispatching the guards than with your knife, but you always have a very limited amount of ammunition, so you have to pick and choose when to use it.


The Good Stuff

Graphically, Velvet Assassin is a bit of a stunner, with good character models and animation, and impressive environments. The lighting and real time shadows are particularly impressive with this title, creating a very intense and dramatic feeling as you are sneaking Violette around in the shadows, avoiding the guards and waiting for the right time for the kill. This puts the game (at least visually) on par with the more recent Thief and Splinter Cell titles.

The Bad Stuff

Unfortunately Velvet Assassin is one of those games releases where the bad points far outweigh the good ones. While it’s true that the game is nice to look at, I always say that that great graphics alone do not make a great game and it’s in the gameplay department that this title really falls short of the mark. For starters, the game is very linear, to the point of mind numbing tedium.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have a problem with certain game genres being linear by nature (for example arcade based shooters), but stealth action games need to offer variety and choices in the gameplay. With Velvet Assassin the guards always move along the same paths, are always in the same location when you enter an area and always stop for the same intervals on their patrol.

To further demonstrate this, during the first mission you are tasked with placing explosive charges at a gas facility to destroy it. When you finally get to the area, two guards come round a corner with you just out of view, but in earshot and then proceed to have a subtitled argument, where one guard accuses the other of stealing his chocolate. This is amusing the first time you hear it, but when you die and reload from the autosave, you have the same sequence repeated, with the same dialogue. You need to wait for the sequence to finish, so one of the guards can walk past to a point where you can kill him from the shadows.

The game is littered with tedious moments like this and the gameplay is more about trial and error than anything else. The other annoying thing, which adds to the frustration of replaying linear sections over and over again, is the autosave feature, which you have no control over. There is absolutely no manual save. Games that have wretched autosave systems and nothing else annoy me because this is often used as an artificial and lame way of making the game more of a challenge and is used as a poor way of disguising sub standard game and level design, which is the case with Velvet Assassin.

The other part of the game design that baffles and annoys me in equal amounts is the half-hearted inventory system. As mentioned earlier, Violette can pickup medkits and morphine shots, but only if she is injured or the morphine meter is empty. Again this introduces a lame artificial difficulty mechanic. I guess the developers felt the game needed to be a challenge, but completely failed to come up with a logical way of making the gameplay be more tactical. I would rather have had the ability to carry limited supplies of these items in the inventory and had the challenge upped with better German guard A.I or more cunning level design.

Conclusion

I personally found Velvet Assassin a huge disappointment. I love WW2 and stealth action games, but quite frankly this title just does not deliver much enjoyment. It is very much a missed opportunity, as the concept of a stealth based WW2 game with a female British agent has not really been explored before. I’ve only made it to the second mission, but to emphasise the tedium, I don’t think I can really stand to play anymore of this game. In my opinion, it doesn’t even have an engaging story that makes you want to play right through to the end. The other sad thing is that this game completely fails on a gameplay level to even approach the playability of the Thief or Splinter Cell series, which both perfected and pretty much set the standard for the stealth action genre. There’s no nice way to say this, but if you love WW2 action games and stealth games, there are much better, older titles already out there, at a budget price. Save your money and avoid this title.

Score 3 out 10

Men Of War Review

Men Of War
PC DVD
Developer: Best Way
Publisher: 1C/505 Games
Game website: www.menofwargame.com

Overview

Action Man was one of my favourite childhood toys. I would happily play with my collection for hours on end. I loved changing the uniforms, weapons and accessories around and acting out various war scenarios with my friends. Playing Men Of War brings back the feeling of playing with the toys in a very nostalgic way, however the big difference is that the soldiers here come alive onscreen and blow the living crap out of one another!

This is the third game in a series of WW2 strategy games by Russian developer Best Way, having previously done the critically acclaimed Soldiers: Heroes of World War 2 and Faces Of War. On the surface at least, the same basic formula is here for another stint into WW2. You have 24 missions spread over 3 campaigns; one for the Russians, one for the Americans and one for the Germans. You also have all the usual multiplayer options, together with the ability to play any of the 24 main missions co-operatively.

The same small scale, squad based real time strategy is present, together with the direct control system, where the player can move units around with the cursor keys and aim the weapon (or turret when in a tank) with the mouse. It’s still a great system that still works well, two games on. You also still have the ability to equip your soldiers with whatever weapons, ammo, equipment and even helmets that you find dotted around the battlefields, in crates, in vehicles or on the dead bodies of fallen comrades or the enemy.

In terms of differences or improvements over the previous efforts, there are a few worth mentioning. For starters, the squad-based grouping that was first introduced in Faces Of War has been given a good tweak and you can now simply just click on an A.I controlled ally when the “clutching hand” animated icon appears. This is much less fiddly than having to click on a interface icon and then find a sweet spot on an ally to click on to encourage them to join your team. The squad cover system seems to have been improved also and now when you have a team selected and you click near a building or sandbags etc, the soldiers intelligently take cover around the structure.

The Good Stuff

The real gem with Men Of War is the sense of scale within both the environments and the level of destruction. Gunfire, explosions and the sheer tonnage of a tank can lay waste to both property and human life, in abundance. In the heat of the action you get a real sense of being involved in a gritty conflict or one of those old, Sunday afternoon WW2 movies, which I love. The effect is so compelling, at times you feel almost sorry for the for the enemy as the poor little buggers desperately try to hold a position, only for you to blow the hell out of their cover with direct fire from your tank, sending bodies and debris flying into the air. I make the game sound a bit easy, but in fact this is actually a very tough game.

I’m a seasoned strategy gamer, but I found myself switching back to the easy level after a couple of missions and unfortunately, this may put some people off. The good news is that while it is stupidly hard at times, you have so much fun that you quite often don’t mind the challenge.

The Bad Stuff

Unfortunately, the poor path finding from the previous two games is still present and you quite often find your troops taking the longest way round only to get killed, or a tank plough through cover that you were planning to use later during your assault. I can appreciate that having a fully destructible environments presents a challenge for coders, but I thought path finding had progressed beyond this poor level.

In terms of the overall quality of the game, this is probably one of the worst titles in recent memory for voice acting, which is a real shame as the production values in other areas of the game are quite high. I have noticed that this is a common problem with games developed in Eastern Europe, but I do wonder if Best Way simply ran out of budget for this, as the quality really is poor.

Conclusion

I liked Men Of War, but it has to be said that there is nothing much original about the game or the setting as it is yet another WW2 real time strategy game. This is not really helped by the choice of settings within the campaigns as you have an interesting one with the airborne invasion of Crete for the Germans, but the Russian and U.S campaigns are settings that have been done to death. It would have been nice to see maybe an operation in Burma with British troops, or maybe resistance/partisan fighters instead of the Russian setting (or hell, maybe even a Japanese campaign?).

If you love WW2 strategy games, like a good challenge and can forgive some of the games shortcomings, then I can highly recommend this title. It’s a fun game that will keep you coming back for more.

Score: 8 out 10

Resident Evil 4 Wii Edition: Game Review

First of all, I just wanted to point out that this review is very much “spoiler free” as I wanted to take into account any Nintendo Wii owning readers that may not have already played the Gamecube or Playstation 2 versions of the game.

Overview

The Resident Evil series of games have been without any doubt, one of the most influential and successful game franchises, spawning a multitude of sequels on various gaming platforms and three big screen movies. If you’re into computer games, it is a fair bet that you have played at least one of the games, or at the very least heard of the series (unless you’ve been under a rock).

The Wii Edition is basically the same game as the Gamecube and subsequent Playstation 2 release, but with the extras from the Playstation 2 version and controls specifically for the Wii (more on this in a bit). The basic plot setup is that it has been 6 years since the tragic events in Racoon City and the Umbrella Corp is now pretty much bankrupt. You initially play the game as Leon S. Kennedy, a former cop, now working as an agent for the U.S government and you have been sent on a special mission somewhere in Europe to find the U.S president’s daughter, who has been kidnapped. The opening of the game is set very nicely with a cutscene, using the very capable game engine, where Leon is being driven to a remote village by a couple of local police. The police drop Leon off near the village and it quickly becomes apparent that there is something not quite right about this place or its inhabitants. I will not say any more than this regarding the plot as I do not want to spoil it, but suffice to say that its very engaging, creepy, exciting and well written stuff.

If you’re new to this version of the game and if you’ve played the earlier titles, the first thing that will make you think “wow”, is the switch from trademark static camera angles of the series, to a fully fledged 3d game engine. You view the action just behind Leon in a third person perspective view and when important events happen, cutscenes kick in using the in-game engine to further the plot, so the transition from playable sections to narrative and vice-versa are seamless. The graphics, while being a step up from the Playstation 2 version are maybe not quite cutting edge compared to newer titles on say X360 or Playstation 3, but they certainly do the job here and you are presented with a chilling, gritty world as a result. Animation and sound are both well done also and there is a slightly haunting, unnerving sound track that plays in sections when you are not in combat, that switches to a more upbeat dramatic piece when the action kicks in.

Resident Evil 4 is still all about survival horror, with you facing off against various nasties (both “human” and other things), with limited ammo, of course! There’s also a fair share of puzzle solving and exploration and the usual finding of notes to put in your journal, which in turn help to further the plot. The main new thing with the transition of the franchise to the Wii is of course the controls and Capcom have done a pretty good job with this. You move Leon around with the analogue stick on the Nunchuck . Holding down the Z button while pushing forward puts you into a run and holding the Z button while pulling back on the analogue turns Leon 180 degrees. Holding down the B button on the Wii Remote puts Leon into a targeting mode where he raises the equipped weapon and a targeting crosshair onscreen moves around as you move the Wii Remote. The only drawback to this system is that you cannot move and aim/fire your weapon at the same time. There are also set sequences where you have to manically wave the Wii Remote to avoid certain hazards (I don’t want to give away any spoilers here!).

The whole system is very well implemented and the use of the Wii Remote for things like the targeting really immerses you nicely into the action. You also, of course have access to the usual stuff like inventory and map via other button presses. The “typewriter” style save system is still present, but this time you do not need to find an accompanying ribbon to use the typewriter to save. I always found the old system rather annoying as I feel that any game save system should be very simple, so this is a welcome change. The other new change is the concept of money and a kind of “shop”. Some enemies leave behind treasure when you kill them and treasure can also be found in some crates and barrels when you smash them. You also find various other valuable items such as gems. Dotted around the maps are a number of rather dodgy merchant guys where you can buy and sell various items. You can also upgrade your weapons firepower, reload time and ammo capacity. I found this system worked quite well as it added an extra tactical level to the game as you only of course have limited inventory space and cash on hand.

The Good Stuff

There is a great deal to like about this game. The visuals and audio are great, the locations, puzzles and combat are varied, the plot is very engaging and well written and the addition of the Wii controls are very well done. The game lasts a decent amount of time with a solid 20 hours plus of adventuring and throughout that time you will be captivated and on the edge of your seat, with sweaty palms and a raised heartbeat!

The Bad Stuff

To be perfectly honest, there isn’t really much about this release to gripe about. Capcom have taken what was already a fantastic game on the Gamecube and Playstation 2 and successfully ported the whole thing over to the Wii. One thing that is slightly disappointing is that while the graphics are still excellent and certainly pushed the Gamecube and Playstation 2 to their limits, they don’t really stretch the significantly greater capabilities of the Wii and I think it would have been nice if they had been overhauled or given a “new lick of paint” to take advantage of the extra power for the Wii Edition of the game. The other minor gripe that I have is the very old and clichéd mechanic of “breaking the crates/barrels” to find stuff. I know its still a mechanic that works in action/adventure games, but it would have been nice to see something a bit different in a title that gets so much right.

Conclusion

Resident Evil 4 is still a great game and is worthy of a purchase even if you have played the original Gamecube or Playstation 2 versions, as the new Wii controls really do enhance the experience. The gun aiming with the Wii Remote does take a bit of time to get used to, but once you do you will be moving around and lining up that next head shot in no time! If you own a Nintendo Wii then you should own this game, its that simple as this game really is that good.

Score: 9 out 10