Eckyman.com

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…

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..

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.

Slow month for gaming.

1. Guitar – Learnt some new things and started recording some ideas
2. Socom 4 (PS3) – Single Player on Elite
3. Red Dead Redemption (Xbox360) – Second time through the story

So… PSN being down sank my plans of whipping some folks on Socom 4 all month and I had to stick to the single player. Completed it on Normal, half with the Sharpshooter, half with just the Sony Move and Navigation controller. I enjoyed the campaign but it wasn’t anything remarkable. The team based element is quite good once you get into the swing of it. If you try and one man army it and only have your team there as backup you won’t get the most out of it.

If you take your time and set up the teams well it can be very fun to use. You can stealth team mates into flanking positions and set up ambushes very easily. There is also a nice option that allows you to mark targets for takedown, but only on your say so. This gave me a few great moments in the single player.

I’m now playing through the single player campaign on Elite difficulty, with the Sony Move and Navi controller, and recording it for my youtube channel. You can watch me play the first mission here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUpQW3rWpSo

With LA Noire coming up I decided to restart the single player on Read Dead Redemption. Well, technically I put it back on so I could ride through the desert (on a horse with no name) and listen to Ennio Morricone… but one thing led to another and I’m about 5 hours in to the story again. Every time I play I’m constantly blown away at how impressive RDR’s setting is. I could sit and look at scenery for hours in this game!

Mainly though I have been playing guitar. I’d not played seriously in nearly 10 years so had to go back and refresh myself on a few things, and build up the ol’ callouses once more. Picked up some new things and started messing around mic’ing amps up and recording/editing stuff in Audacity. Not sure why I left it so long till playing again but kicking myself for stopping when I did.

Damn well won’t be stopping again this time that is for sure!

Hectic month for gaming. Been hammering the Socom 4 beta, Minecraft again, plus a few PS3 titles I picked up preowned.

1. Socom 4 – Has issues but still a lot of fun!
2. Minecraft – Just playing with the update. I now have wolves!
3. Burnout Paradise – Was not keen on this at release for various reasons. Have put a little more time in and I’m enjoying it a lot. Still has some annoying things though. More to follow.
4. Metal Gear Solid 4 – Completed all the others. Thought it about time I conquered this one too. Lots of upgrades, still the same old game.

I had to laugh when a cut scene reminded me no less than about 8 times that the guy I was speaking to sold guns, and I could buy guns from him, because that’s what he sold. Guns. If I ever wanted any guns, I could go see him.. because he buys and sells guns.

“Say, did I ever tell you I sell guns?”

“YES! I get it already… I got it 20 fecking minutes ago when you first said it!”

Then of course Otacon has to tell me twice more over the radio that the dude I was just talking too sold guns. Just in case I missed it being repeated in every other sentence.

Don’t get me wrong, I dig MGS. I just have to laugh at some of the dialogue and cut scenes. For example… given that Solid Snake is a hardened battle operative who has seen his fair share of action, does anyone really believe he wouldn’t know about terms such as “war price”? Or general war economics?

I understand you may need to inform the player what it is… but the way it is presented makes Solid Snake look like some rookie who has no idea about anything. It’s like this throughout all the games too. In trying to keep the player up to speed, it makes the main character look like an idiot.

New console, new games…

1. Demon’s Souls – My review.
2. Uncharted 2 – Great game, upcoming post on that.
3. God of War 3 – Shorter than expected but really enjoyed it.
4. Killzone 3 – Very fun shooter. Currently playing it with the Move controller, more on that soon.

As usual, expect some posts on the above games… got a lot to talk about on these!

Kind of a twofer this month as I missed the Dec post and I was largely playing the same stuff over Christmas as I am now.

1. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Multiplayer)
2. Transformers: War for Cybertron (Multiplayer)
3. Minecraft (Multiplayer)
4. Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy (Multiplayer)

Battlefield naturally still reigning supreme. Cannot sing this games praises enough, the players however.. can be problematic. Upcoming post on that.

Back into Transformers multiplayer recently. Not many players still online (peaking at about 1200 players during UK evenings) but more than enough to get constant games going. Enjoyed it at the time but as usual, other multiplayer games were occupying my time. Finding it a lot of fun again… I’d forgotten how seamless to the action the transforming mechanic was! Can heavily recommend this to people looking through the pre-owned sections.

My Minecrafting had slowed down considerably lately. My offline world has underwater bases, sky bases, a HUGE mob tower, many caves explored and several stacks of rare ores sitting in chests. Naturally the only thing I could do was to delete and regen a new world. As it turns out, the new world was so interesting I upped it to the Fugazi Minecraft server I run to test out the new server patches. All offline saves have now been deleted and I only play on our server now that multiplayer actually works!

Last but not least… I have returned to Jedi Academy after my self imposed exile. The Euro server I played on is up and running again so have been playing with a few familiar faces I’ve not seen in a while. Game is as fun as ever, and I’m as naff as ever and still needing practice

Thankfully there is a wave of new games on the way that I want, so maybe the ‘Playing this month’ section will see some variation in the not too distant future.

It’s going to take something special to knock Battlefield down the charts however….

This months playlist;

1. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Multiplayer)
2. Minecraft
3. Bloodlines

A return to Battlefield this month. Loved the multiplayer to this but it got shelved for a while to make room for new releases. Back on it with a vengeance now. Excellent game…. well, when your team are playing the objectives it is. Can be frustrating when they don’t.

The bloodlines beta was a lot of fun. Interesting game, will post some thoughts on that soon.

Bit of a change up this month.

Had meant to get back into Jedi Knight after a too long period of absence (work/holiday) but when I logged in I found one of my regular servers has vanished, and the other never seems to have players on when I check the server tracker.

So for the time being, like Obi-Wan in New Hope, I guess I’m in exile waiting till the time is right to reappear.

Anyway, this months playlist;

1. Minecraft
2. Skate 3
3. Warcraft

No fourth this month. Skate 3 would have been number one as I’ve been hammering it making videos for the last couple of weeks.. but in the last 7 days I’ve seen enough of Minecraft to make it my number one this month. Maybe not in hours played, but certainly in fun. Anyway.. I’ll talk a little about Minecraft in another post.

Warcraft is up there as I re-subbed to say hello to some friends, but then I’ve only logged in about 3 times. £8 well spent there! Every time I do this I reconfirm what I already knew… I enjoy the social aspects as our guildies are great, but as far as the game goes I’m tapped out.

I tried to do a few dailies on my main, but I’ve done them so often I have zero motivation. My tanking is probably a little rusty after about 11 months of not playing so I’ve not done any so far. Started levelling my old main who has been stuck at 75 since Wotlk came out and I switched to DK as my main. That’s been reasonably fun I guess, but again, I’ve done all these quests before.

I do miss tanking though so I’ll have to have a whirl at that again before my sub runs dry.

This months playlist;

1. Skate.3
2. Monster Hunter 3
3. Just Cause 2
4. Limbo