I would say this is a pretty sure-fire bet for a gift for an online FPS (First Person Shooter... games where you run around and shoot people) because everyone has it and plays it. But it is for this reason, you might not buy it for someone, because they might already have it. This is sort of a minorly retooled version of Modern Warfare 1 which was a huge hit filling the void that Bungie left after Soup-Naziing the next Halo installment for a few years (NO GAME FOR YOU).
**EDITORIAL ON BUNGIE: I have asterisked this out because Bungie isn't the developer of the game I'm rating, I just wanted to slam these bags of douche while I have the time. Now, Bungie almost fucking owns Microsoft by now, so why the fuck can't they get a fucking Halo game out every year? Granted their last installment Halo 3 was amazing and ground breaking. They are one of the only FPS's that let you play with up to 4 guests to one account; hell, you can make VIDEOS of ass beatings and show them to your friends. Amazing, amazing stuff... Here is where the buck stops, once they make the game they stop all of the development for it... almost. They make a new map pack by the time you are already sick of the game. You drop money sight-unseen on a pack of maps but since the shock is worn off of Halo to begin with, you will lose interest in these new maps very quickly. And then as soon as Bungie is done they toss the maps out for free like a used up hooker saying, "Who would want you now?" But look at Blizzard, they develop MMORPG's (Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games... mouthful... keyboard full :P) for the PC. They are constantly in development of new dungeons and new items all the time. They only charge extra money when they do a massive expansion for the game (whole new continents to explore). But on the other hand Bungie did end up giving cool looking flaming armor to all of their loyal fans that waited outside stores all night just to get the game on it's release date (almost single-handily saving the X-Box Live online network). OH WAIT, NO THEY DIDN'T they gave it to the true unsung heroes of the gaming... themselves and said, "No you can't (have it)" to all their loyal fans.**
So there is the back story, Call of Duty took the FPS throne from Halo due to their arrogance. Call of Duty makes a game almost every year, there aren't crazy bells and whistles that Halo had, but hey it was NEW. You get sick of a game no matter how good it is after several months unless they have new stuff going all the time. And so enter CODMW2, has the shooting action online you come to expect (but also the "it's over already" 5 hour campaign I've come to expect). They have added some cool things, in addition to the 4 letter clan tag, you can now have a little logo and a banner that comes up when you shoot someone. The logos are small little pictures, some animated and some strange like little Luchador wrestlers. And the banners have all sorts of things on them like nods to gaming culture like one that says "All Your Base Are Belong To Us" and also ones that show little pot leaves and say "Blunt Trauma" and "Joint Ops" (surprisingly popular, who would have thought marijuana enthusiasts would enjoy playing videogames all day?). They don't tell you how to get them, you just see them on other people's name tag, and it tells you that you got them. There have been several times where I was like, "how the hell did I get that?" I suppose you could go on the internet but there are so many you probably wouldn't want to look at how you got all of them. Those familiar with the game will remember from the first one the upgrading system you get guns based on level and you start to unlock additions for it by killing, etc. You also have the upgrades with some cool ones like "Bling" where you can have extra accessories for your gun, so like a scope and hear sensor.
Things I liked:
- Addictive online play, and as I said, you probably know a dozen people already that have this, whether you know it or not. So playing with them is always a good time.
- Cool customizations like the little banner over your name and a little logo, and there are many funny ones so if you are like me you will change it up many times.
- Great upgrades like "Bling" and even advantages you can get with "death streaks" so if you are getting your but kicked, you can earn martyrdom or final stand to help you get back in the game.
- Almost ridiculous amounts of kill streak items, there is even a tactical nuclear strike; it's like things I thought they should have on the last one got put in there... crazy.
Things I didn't like:
- Weird server interpretation, you can see on the kill cam as you could before but the thing I hate is when I shoot the shit out of someone and I look on the kill cam and I didn't even fire, I just scream like a girl and die a humiliating death leaving the person on the other screen to think that they are some kind of Kirosawa film badass. Sometimes when I overhear people telling a story I told they will say, "this is what JKon said happened, so I don't know how much of it is true, he exaggerates sometimes." Well I'm Honest Abe compared to this game. If that isn't bad enough, you can look like a little bitch for everyone in the game if you are featured on the "Game Winning Kill" cam. I think this weird server interpretation has something to do with the next thing I didn't like.
- NO SPLIT SCREEN YET? WTF? I think the shaky server interpretation has something to do with this, I think that they use it as a way to disguise lag times. But like previously how I said the server makes up stories, well you can't make up a story and tell it to someone if one of the other witnesses is there. So I think it can't rapidly correct two different perspectives if I'm even on the right track with the conspiracy theory. I also believe it is the same for the single player because they would have to reset the enemy "aggro tables" which says who to shoot if a player is detected. I probably don't know what the fuck I'm talking about but I just have this theory.
- Single player is a little thin... It's an improvement but I am pretty sure they just said, "this is an online game" so no point to making it very long. If you don't play online, I'd say rent don't buy, but still worth checking out. It's just a shame, you know what I hate about playing with people online? Playing with people online.
- The victors get the spoils... always. It's probably worse than in the previous game, if you are getting your ass kicked, you're going to get your ass kicked even worse. They tried to fix it, having death streaks, care packages (that could have anything), and hardline which starts you off on a 1 kill or death streak right away so you only need to get 1 less of them to get what you need. But that doesn't help people like me who can't get even a 3 kill streak. But there is nothing quite like getting killed by a guy 10 times and then getting killed by the helicopter he just called in.
Batman: Arkham Asylum
I liked this game, in fact it sort of rekindled the old days of reading Batman comics. But when I read a little thing about how many villains it has, I was a little mislead. It looked to be over 30 but there are really only are about a little more than a half dozen you fight. There are also physical cameos by another 1/2 dozen and then a huge cast of baddies who have left their mark in some way on the asylum, for instance there is a cell that's covered in calendar pages and finding it unlocks the profile for Calendar Man. While a little disappointed that they didn't have the entire "Rogue Gallery" available to be fought, but I am okay, it would be a little silly to go fisticuffs with The Ratcatcher or something. Most of the ones that I like were there so I'm content.
Things I liked
- Instead of a waypoint system, you go into "detective mode" and track the person you are looking for.
- Additional play time fits into the story, it's not just some random Easter Egg hunt. There are also maps so you can find out which room it's in, there are several of these secrets, a couple hundred maybe?
- Main story has challenging parts but is pretty easy all in all; it has very challenging "challenges" if you want to test your Batmaning; but if you are just eager to see how the story unfolds it has just the right amount of difficulty.
- Guns really do freaking kill you! You can shrug off maybe one or two bullets but you definitely don't want to get shot so you can't really just muscle your way through parts that require stealth like you can in some games.
Things I didn't like
- Not actually being Batman puts you at a supreme disadvantage. There are almost too many gadgets and things you can do so adding another element to Batman. He must be excellent at tool belt inventory. Where as I am in a boss fight clumsily fumbling through the 8 different gadgets he has.
- For a Cloak and Dagger game, you have way too much Cloak and not nearly enough Dagger. When the purpose of the game is stealth, most games have an engine in place that measure shadows and other elements. This one is basically, if you do anything they can see you. So it's very unforgiving, also there are very limited things you can do to hide. In the gun rooms you can hop from gargoyle to gargoyle but they can still see you until by some huge feat you go fast enough that they literally can't keep up with you. Then the do nutty shit like upping the anty making the gargoyles explode if you touch them. There is even a thing called an "inverted takedown" which you can unlock. In the rare instance that someone is directly (I mean DIRECTLY) underneath you but haven't detected you, you can drop down and take them out. But they start screaming and give you away. So it's totally useless.
- They are pretty generous with add-ons but you have to meet a criteria, like preorder from Gamestop or have a PS3 and you still have to download them storing them on your console instead of them being on the disk. And they are mostly just the challenges, and you really have to be good at the game to do those. They aren't extra levels as I was led to believe.
Borderlands
I really liked this one, it's a combination of a FPS and RPG (definitions above). Some people said that this was already done in Fallout 3 but I've never played it, that one was called "Oblivion with guns" I would say that this one is Diablo with guns. This plays to my fondness for shooting games and for color-coded loot tables. It says "87 Gazillion guns" on the advertisements, some people say it's false advertisement, I say that isn't a real number so obviously a joke. What it does have, is a computer generated gun system, it names them but they have different specs, level requirements, appearances. So really limitless, after killing a named character he dropped a certain gun. Killing him again netted me a gun that was named and looked the same but had some numbers changed around (pretty much comparable either way, a flip of the coin really). They even have the ability to do class based combat (which I'm not sure if Fallout 3 had or not). Each character has 3 specs and basically with a level 50 cap, you can go down two different trees so dual specing, there is also even a "class mod" which can boost a class or give you a helping of talents from a tree you didn't even touch.
Characters:
Siren - This is I guess a rogue class, apparently there was a patch to make her more effective, but I still think she's busted (her spec not her "girl parts" as the game calls them). She can go invisible for a certain amount of time, but that's not much and even then it's basically getting the drop on one guy (not even a guaranteed kill) making soloing pretty impossible.
Soldier - This is the Paladin of this game has an amazing soloing spec called "Infantry" and also has a support class which is focused on ammo regeneration and even a healing spec. As you might expect you shoot people to heal them once you have the "cauterize" talent, you also gain health regens for the rest of the group. I haven't gone online with it, so I don't know how a heal spec works 100%.
Brick - This guy can be a tank or explosives expert. Unfortunately he lacks any great long range skills and by default you can only have 3 grenades. For soloing you probably want to be a "Berzerker" which focuses on beating enemies up with your fist... yeah still the long range problem and the fact you get SHOT when you punch people. Probably would make a really good tank online though.
Hunter - This has a spec focusing on snipers and one focusing on pistols and one focusing on a pet. The A.I. for the pet isn't close to where it needs to be. It gets hung up on walls (why even make it be able to clip walls is beyond me) it's way underpowered and it's ideally for getting guys behind cover but if they are behind cover it doesn't always see them so you are left killing it and saying, "thanks anyways." But this guy is more like the mage of the group, huge DPS but if he is getting shot at you'd be better just giving him a Nerf bat.
Things I liked:
- Combined being a nerd with being a nerd... seriously though, I like the spec and loot systems, and even the party idea (though haven't tried it out yet... need friends...).
- Huge environment... unfortunately most is literally a garbage dump, but still fun.
- Semi long story, and once you are finished you play through again with enemies that are a higher level to gear up, bueno!
- Funny sense of humor!
Things I didn't like:
- Broken or unsoloable specs, some of these are atrociously hard to solo. I'm sure in a team dynamic it goes away but some of these have such a huge cooldown on actions with such little effect, it makes me think it will be drawing straws for the Soldier/Sniper position.
- Cars are made out of paper mache. First game where I've said, this guy looks pretty hard, better get out of the car to fight him. It is nice to get a "mount" early in the game though, something RPG's could learn a lesson from.
- A little vulgar when it didn't need to be, making it unnecessarily go for an older demographic.
- Pet A.I. is hoooooooorible! Only the Hunter and Soldier even have them, but sometimes it makes me cringe!
- I don't know anyone that has it... sadness!
