Good luck Scott, and everyone else in Gustav's path

While I may have nudged Scott a bit in Twitter I really hope he, and anyone else has gotten to safety and will remain that way until everything can return to normal. Be sure to visit The Slackerz comic, and click a few ads.

Too Human Text Review

Too Human is an action RPG set in a world where Norse mythology meets cyber-punk. The premise of the story is fine with me, but it’s execution is a bit lackluster.

The first thing you need to know about in this game are the controls. Left stick is movement, right stick is attacking/aiming. You center the camera with left bumper and supposedly if you hold left bumper while out of combat the right stick will revert to it’s traditional camera controlling chores. I never got that to work. Fortunately the camera does not need a lot of babysitting. Attacking an enemy is as easy as pointing the right stick in their direction and there are scenarios where you’re thankful for the degree of precision it affords you. My major annoyance with this scheme lies in gunplay, which is all but mandatory for some encounters. Selecting the proper target out of large groups while stationary can be problematic, and while running it becomes neigh impossible. I was also more than a little upset by how eager Baldur’s willingness to lock on to and random (or in many cases nonexistent) object in the direction he was facing, instead of the poison spewing monster running right at him.

I also take issue with the character balance. I like the idea of paladins. If I can crank up my defense and heal ad naseum I’m a happy little murder machine.  So I picked the Bioengineer class to start with. If I didn’t want to stand around waiting for my health to come back the class might have worked, but this game demands you charge into the fray. I could never get my defense high enough or my auto-healing powerful enough to live through a big fight after level one. I rolled a Champion class character, and I had no problems.

That’s really all the game does wrong on a major scale. If I were one to nitpick I’d complain about the clunky menus (which becomes a lesser issue later in the game when you level less frequently), or the way the game follows the mythology in every way except the major premise (I won’t give it away for the spoiler sensitive) but really they’re minor issues.

So the game’s technically solid. Fantastic. The real question is: Is it fun? The answer is: sometimes. The game is at it’s best when you’re in the middle of a massive army, quickly laying waste to the hordes. Bosses and “elite” monsters on the other hand break the game’s pace. The first boss required little more from me than to hold both sticks in the same direction for several minutes.

The story was mildly engaging, but at the end of the first game I didn’t feel like Baldur achieved anything. If you’ understand story structure: the game ends at the end of act two. The closing cinematic essentially says “Buy Too Human 2.”

The voice actors in this game did not get paid enough. They could have gotten $100,000 each, they weren’t paid enough. The only voice I didn’t particularly care for was the sultry NORD, mostly because of how many times I had to listen to her voice when recording the Too Human combat reel on the demo. Everyone sounded like a real person save a few minor characters. The dialog must have been difficult to present, but these guys pulled it off for the most part. I do wish your npc-tag-alongs had more lines of dialog to cycle through.

Skip it: Since a single play through of the game is under ten hours and nothing remarkable happens, it’s easy to stay away from this title.

Rent it: This game is a solid rental. If you’ve got about eight hours to kill check it out.

Buy it: This game will find it’s fans. People who are into action rpgs will find a lot to love here. When this game drops to the $20-$30 range it will be a really easy recommendation.

8/29/08 Gaming News [Pax, PopFly, Oddworld]

All the cool kids are at the Penny Arcade Expo today. I am sitting in Minneapolis, fantasizing about a world where making my way to industry shows care about the midwest. At least we have Gencon.

Microsoft put out their PopFly game creator beta. Popfly uses Silverlight (read: flash knock off) but it sounds like the creator will make creating a game super easy. You can check it out here.

Oddworld: Abe’s Odyssey and Oddworld: Abe’s Exoddus are both on Steam. They’re $9 a pop until Thursday, when they become $10 each. You can get both for $15. I suggest that you do. Also encourage them to port Stranger’s Wrath over as that game was also fantastic.

8/28/08 Gaming News [XBL M:tG, Rush DLC Delay]

Magic the Gathering is coming to XBLA. I’m so very glad I broke free of that particular addiction years ago, but if you haven’t you may want to start saving. You have until spring before your life is over.

The Rush album “Moving Pictures” won’t make it out this week. That news makes me sad.

8/27/08 Gaming News [Warhammer, FFXIII, Rock Band DLC]

Warhammer has gone gold. I guess they’ll hit their ship date of 9/18. Good for them. I’m anxious to see how the final game turns out.

Japan won’t be getting Final Fantasy XIII on the 360. So if you live in Japan and own a 360, tough luck. Thank Kotaku’s translators for this breaking news.

I was all geared up to play some Rush on Rock Band last night. Too bad Microsoft/EA wasn’t. There were some undisclosed ‘technical difficulties’ that prevented the album from going up. Curse you Harmonix, curse yooouuuuu!

8/26/08 Gaming News [Fable II fans]

I got this from Destructoid. In March Armblast decided to go on extended Lent. His vow: not to shave until Fable II came out. He’s so money he doesn’t even know. Take a look at his most recent inverted fro:

8/25/08 Gaming News [Left4Dead]

Left 4 Dead has been dated for November 20th. I’m always interested in a new VaLVE game. I hope it hits that launch window. Having read the headlines for the game I have to wonder what’s going on with the PS3 version. First I hear VaLVE say “No way in hell. We hate the PS3z!” Then EA said “VaLVE is totally going to do what we tell them, and we tell them to make a PS3 version so we can make billions of dollarz.” Now I’m reading “50% chance we’re making it for the PS3, but it’s soooo not going to happen this year.” Sounds a bit like a timed exclusive, doesn’t it?

Beyond Good and Evil $4.99 on Steam

Beyond Good and Evil is $4.99 on Steam until 8/25/08. Critics say it’s amazing, I’ll be taking a look for review in the near future.

Bionic Commando: Rearmed Text Review

Capcom continues to release updates to franchises we older gamers admire. This week I’m talking about a re-skinned NES classic: Bionic Commando.

Let’s start with that re-skinning. The characters and animation are incredibly detailed for XBLA. I consistently enjoyed watching Spencer parachute into the level, rolling to a crouch, and nodding to the camera.

The level design is top notch, but since the floor plan is often your worst enemy you may not see the beauty of it right away. In fact I spent a good portion of my time inventing new ways to swear at my television my first 5-15 play-through’s of each level. Eventually I became so frustrated with myself for not making a jump my mind retreated and my thumbs took over. I believe I can complete area 10 with muscle memory alone.

If I were to detract from this game it would surely be because of the controls. It feels as though the original NES controls were left in place, as if the developers didn’t realize we have more buttons to work with now. Some people say the game eventually “clicks” for them, and moving Spencer around the screen becomes second nature. That never happened for me. I was constantly measuring every move I made to allow as much time as possible to maneuver my thumbs into position for the next stage of my jump.

I want to make a quick note about the writing in this game: It has restored my faith in a big publisher’s ability to treat downloadable games with respect. I laughed to myself several times while contacting headquarters or listening to the enemy’s communiqué.

Skip it: If you’re the kind of person who can’t beat a Prince of Persia title without using the rewind button.

Get the demo: If you were born in the 70s or 80s, you’ll probably want to revisit this title. If you kids with your X-Stations and PlayBoxes want to see how you measure up to old school gamers, give BC:R a try.

Buy it: If you are ‘teh h4rdest c0rez’ you’ll want to try making some speed runs in this game.

8/22/08 Gaming News [RTV on XBL, more Rush for Rockband]

It looks like you can register to vote on Xbox Live. I think everyone agrees that this is fantastic, though some blog comments might question the usefulness of the initiative.

Next Tuesday Rush’s masterpiece Moving Pictures, one of the reasons I love Canada, hits Rockband as DLC. It looks like I have a reason to dig my drum kit out of the closet again. Fantastic.

Bionic Commando: Rearmed review will be up this weekend. Too Human should be the week following. I have a few notions on how we’ll get through this final gap before the holiday rush begins. Of course I’m still willing to put what you have to say on the site proper, go ahead and write something up in the forums.

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