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This was originally going to be a positive review of BF3′s multiplayer… but then the article lagged out and for every three words I wrote, two of them lagged right off my page before finally informing me there must be a problem with my words, would I please check my keyboard and try again.

I thought this was odd as I had just finished writing some words about another game, and they didn’t lag all over the page with sudden punctuation marks appearing out of nowhere. I guess if all my other words on every other subject work fine, but not for a BF3 review, it has to be my fault and not BF3′s fault that my words don’t work. Thanks for clearing that up for me EA.

It pains me to say this as a long time Battlefield fan but till they sort out the servers so I can walk for longer than 2 seconds without rubber-banding back to my original position, BF3 can suck it.

Ports are open, all other games work fine and DO NOT lag like this. This has been a constant problem for myself since release making it extremely hard for me to recommend this to anyone in it’s current state. Don’t get me wrong, if it worked, I’d love this game. As it stands it’s an exercise in frustration, all the way from simply trying to get in a game on the same side as your friend, to just trying to navigate the map without rubber-banding all over the place. I turned off in frustration for the last time yesterday feeling it was just pointless to keep trying to play through it.

I had heard today that the servers have been updated so I hold some hope that tonight may be slightly less painful. If not, I’ll be hammering Uncharted 3 some more.

If things are working out for you in BF3, I’m envious

I nearly didn’t get off a console long enough to write this post! Very hectic month (and then some) for gaming, and it shows no signs of slowing down with BF3, Uncharted 3, Skyrim, and SWTOR on the way too. Not that I’m complaining, the last few months have been one long gaming orgasm!

1. Dark Souls (PS3) – Number one and deservedly so. Very likely my GOTY
2. Batman Arkham City (Xbox 360) – Not as good as the first. More later…
3. Ico Collection (PS3) – Just as good the 20th playthrough, especially in HD
4. Driver: San Francisco (Xbox 360) – Still great!
5. Deus Ex: Human Revolution (Xbox 360) – I need to finish this!

So a few things on each title.

Dark Souls is amazing. Just as good as Demons Souls and then some. I absolutely love the level and enemy design in these games and Dark Souls did not let me down. I have half a review ready to go but for the time being you can check out my Demons Souls review as a lot of what I said there applies to this game too;

http://www.eckyman.com/demons-souls-review/

Batman Arkham City was a letdown. There, I said it. Get the pitchforks and let the lynching begin! Not burning me alive yet? OK, I’ll explain my reasoning.

Firstly, Arkham City IS a great game. No doubt. However, as a follow up to Arkham Asylum it falls short in a number of ways. Arkham Asylum has a stronger story, better pacing, and a more climatic build to the end. Arkham City has a stronger combat system, better boss fights, and other minor improvements to the gameplay mechanics. Unfortunately, the story basically just drags on the last hour or so of Arkham Asylum with very little else added.

I have a LOT more to talk about on this one to be honest but this post is going to get lengthy if I don’t move on. Review up soon… when I get a break from all this gaming crack!

Ico Collection. What can I say. Two of my fav games ever made. If you didn’t play these at release, shame on you. If you’ve not picked them up for PS3 because they are just HD PS2 games… shame on you! Go, now! QUICK!

Throw out games as art discussions and call it what it is… Ico is a great puzzler game featuring the least annoying escort mission type gameplay you will ever play. Shadow of the Colossus is a visually impressive treat, soaked liberally with atmosphere, and wrapped up with a kick ass soundtrack. Highly recommended!

I’m still enjoying Driver a lot, working my way through all the extra missions at the moment. It’s taken a back seat lately to make room for newer games but it’s still in rotation.

Deus Ex slipped to bottom place with not much action at all this month. No reflection on the game, I’ve just not had time to finish it off.

BF3 is hopefully coming today/tomorrow so that will no doubt steal the top place, although I don’t see Dark Souls moving over so readily as other games this time…

Got to play a few hours of the beta last night… very fun, although, Op Metro leaves much to be desired.

First section is fine. Outdoors, flanking routes etc. Plays like Battlefield.

Second section takes place inside a subway. Plays like any choke-point corridor shooter filled with camp happy players.

If this is how “infantry only” maps play out in the full game, I wont be going anywhere near them. Or any other map that puts a large section of playable area indoors and forces you into corridors.

Will post up more impressions after I spend some more time with the beta over the weekend.

Just a quick post to recommend ilomilo to anyone looking for a fun puzzler on Xbox Live Arcade.

I’ve not completed it yet, but I’m really enjoying it so far! Will post up a more detailed review when I get done with it.

Starting to get a backlog of half written reviews in my draft folder at the moment so hopefully I’ll get a few of those cleared off this weekend. If the Ico HD collection and the BF3 beta let go of me for enough time to get it done anyway

Ahhh the gaming drought is over! I love this time of year, even if  my bank balance does not.

1. Driver: San Francisco (Xbox 360)
2. Deus Ex: Human Revolution (Xbox 360)
3. Minecraft (PC)
4. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Xbox 360)

Driver took the number one spot this month despite heavy competition from Deus Ex. As I mentioned in an earlier post, Driver is really good! A lot better than I was expecting, and quite possibly some of the most fun I’ve had with a driving game.

Not far off completing Deus Ex now, just need a chunk of time spare so I can sit down and crack on with it. Not the type of game I can play in 20 minute chunks really. Is it as good as the original? Well, no.. but it’s still a great game and certainly more enjoyable (to me) than Mass Effect or most of this generations RPG offerings.

The new Minecraft 1.8 patch added a lot of reason for me to pick it up again. Lot’s of changes and reasons to explore and fight things again. Game had kind of got boring once I set up the Wheel of Pain mob grinder and had no need to ever leave my ice lake, now I’ve started a new world, minus the mob grinder, and gone back to basics.

Creative mode was probably the best update with 1.8 though. I started out using it to test out some redstone ideas and before I knew it I was working on an adventure/puzzle map! I think I put more time in on creative now than I do on survival. Maybe because I feel like I already beat survival, many times on many worlds. Creative actually gives me a point to all the building beyond killing time.

As you know, Bad Company 2 is a frequent guest of the “Playing this month…” section so not a lot to say on that front. Although… I will say, I’ve seen more cheap tactics over the last three nights than I’ve seen in months! Crate bashing, 8 man strong medic trains, 8 man strong USAS recon groups, circle jerking, tank sniping, even C4 on the bloody UAV has been going on. From level 50 players too? I know you’re probably bored of the game at this point, but really? No need for the cheap tactics..

This isn’t my review as I’ve not finished it yet. Not far off mind you but I’m digesting this like a large meal, reclined on my couch and at my own pace.

However… what I did want to talk about is the idiotic moaning about the difficulty of the boss fights if you go for a stealth build. You’ll have seen it by now, the tears flowing on this subject are fast and salty.

Let us clear a few things up.

1. I’m using stealth. All my points went in non-combat, stealth/hacking related areas.
2. The bosses go down faster than a hooker with a blank cheque as long as you THINK about it.

First boss fight. Pants, that dudes arm is a cannon, I don’t have many weapons and all my points are in non-combat augs.

Wait, I do have a brain and the ability to think my way around a problem so.. what I’ll do is first toss this EMP grenade at the walking cannon guy. OK, that fried him. Now how about stacking a couple of these explosive looking barrels at his feet and blowing them up while he is dazed. Yeah, he didn’t like that and the EMP grenade has worn off. OK, so I’ll hide behind this pillar and place two frag mines either side so the boss can’t get close. OK, looks like the boss just walked over one. Wait? What? It’s over? I thought these boss fights were supposed to be tough according to reviewers?

Took no time at all, nothing stressful about it, and I didn’t need a single point in any augmentations to use my smegging brain!

Second boss fight. Let’s see, EMP grenade worked well last time, lets try that. Hmm, not so good this time. OK, you like charging at me? So I’ll put my back to the wall and place frag mines in front and to the sides of me. Charge that! Oh you did.. OK, have 3 rockets in the face from the rocket launcher I saved all the way through this level. Ahh, you died did you? Didn’t take long.

Well, I guess I had a rocket launcher, what did I expect. Reload, throw away rocket launcher and pick up heavy rifle from the room right before the boss, available to all players no matter of build.

Same tactic, back to wall, frag mines down… dumbass ran into one again and is standing around inviting me to drill her with bullets. Naturally I aim to please and just as fast, the second boss is down.

If you are one of those people moaning about the difficulty of the bosses on Deus Ex, I suggest growing a pair… or spending 30 seconds thinking of a way around the situation that does not involve moaning all over the internet about the hike in difficulty when in reality, the boss fights are the easiest part of the game.

Don’t really have time to post a decent review of this yet but here is a quick summary till I get a little more time…

It’s damn good!

Multiplayer is a blast…. as of 2:30am this morning I was ranked 94 on the overall board, and 25 for both Tag and Trailblazer! I doubt I’ll get it, but I’m aiming for top ten Tag/Trailblazer tonight! Not usually a fan of leaderboards but this kinda crept up on me so I’ll try to take it as far as poss before a slew of people overtake me.

…and no, I’m not an Alleyway Allen either! You all know who you are! Get out into traffic and get tagged you chickens! Spinning in alleyways because you can’t drive is pretty low. I can spawn a vehicle where I want so it won’t work either

Will be posting a full review and some multiplayer footage soon.

Still pretty slow on the gaming front… even more so with the PS3 drive dying.

1. From Dust (Xbox360)
2. Donkey Kong Country Returns (Wii)
3. Minecraft (PC)
4. Jedi Academy (PC)

Minecraft and Jedi made it back into the rotation again as they usually do when other sources of games dry up. Finally completed Donkey Kong, can’t recommend that game enough. Even though I’m an established “disappointed with the Wii” kinda guy.

From Dust is a nice throwback to the days of my Populous past. I loved that game back in the day and have been following From Dust for a while now. Was going to pick it up on PSN or PC but as the Xbox got an early release I grabbed it there instead. Very, very fun game. Will try and get a review up asap.

For the first time I’d like to open “Playing this month…” up to the readers for once. Any suggestions for games to play this month? Any platform, any genre… within reason.

Leave a comment or shoot me an email with your game suggestions.

Two Playstation1 consoles.

Five Playstation2 consoles.

Three Xbox360 consoles.

What do all these have in common?

If you guessed they all stopped working within 12 months of purchase you’d be 100% right! As of last night I can now officially add my PS3 to that list too. Roughly six months after purchase and it no longer reads disks.

I never thought it would come to this but I’m seriously considering saying my final goodbyes to console gaming.

I put PC gaming on ice in the late 90′s rationalising that constant hardware upgrades would wind up more expensive over time than converting to consoles. Over the years I’ve been proven wrong on that count not once, not twice, not even three times…  eleven console failures now. Fair enough one was in warranty when it went down, and luckily the PS3 is still under warranty, but that’s still 9 consoles I’ve either had to pay out-of-warranty repair costs, or purchase a new console, or rip one to pieces and self repair it when possible.

I keep all my consoles free of dust and well ventilated at all times. I don’t move them around, they don’t get dropped, bashed, and they are not in direct sunlight. They are as well cared for as they could be without me sealing them in an airtight container and never turning them on.

Console hardware has been a joke for decades now. Even cartridge based consoles required you to blow into the slots numerous times to get stuff working at times.

To say I’m narked off with console gaming at the moment is somewhat of an understatement.

Microsoft confirmed a growing suspicion I’ve had for a while with their E3 presentation.

They are slowly losing touch with gamers.

At least 70% of the Microsoft presentation was fluff. They have an amazing piece of technology in Kinnect and the highlight of the show was voice recognition? Couldn’t we have done that with the existing Xbox headset already?

It seems to me as though they are trying to make the Xbox the ‘everyman’ console and focusing on the media aspects a little too much. Gamers, and their Live subs put the Xbox where it is. Invest that money in gaming. Not bringing UFC pay-per-view to the Xbox for smegs sake!

Last year it was motion control dashboards, this year it’s voice control. Neither of which were shown to push gaming forward at all in my opinion.