Recently in Video Games Category

There is always one game in the Fall that grabs my attention.  This year it is Bulletstorm,  I love First Person Shooters and this one has a number of cool twists.  Like a colon cleansing skill shot called Fire in the Hole.

The game is produced by People Can Fly and Epic Games.  CliffyB gives you a walkthrough in this video.  I was a big Unreal Tournament fan, but it appears that franchise is dead.  Bulletstorm looks like it can fill that gap.  The weapons are wickedly fun and there are skill points for different methods of killing enemies.  Use a whip to bring a guy in close and kick him.  Kick a door down and smash the dude underneath.  It goes on and on.  There must be tons of achievements/trophies to unlock.

Rick Remender (Punisher, Fear Agent) is writing the story and dialogue for this game.  The art style is reminiscent of Tony Moore's artwork, too, but I don't think he worked on it.

This video by producer Tanya Jessen shows off a different area and enemies that are called Burnouts.  They look like Human Torch characters that are grounded and looking to give you a hug.  Tanya explains how they decided to introduce a few things in the game.  There is also a nifty 4 barrel shotgun that you have to see.  Nuff Said!

Link: Bulletstorm for XBox 360

Link: Bulletstorm for Playstation 3

I'm a wasteful type of Dude.  I get tired of some gadget, game, or book and sell it, recycle, or throw it away.  I feel good for a while, like I removed a cancerous growth from some part of my body.  My old lady feels better because the house is less cluttered and everything is groovy.  A few months or a year later, I find myself wishing I hadn't gotten rid of this or that.  This happened to me recently with the Playstation 2.  I started thinking about how cool some of those games were.  And those games will probably never be replicated the same on the PS3.

I prayed and prayed about my long lost PS2.  Should I buy a PS2 Slim?  I really should not, because I have a ton of PS3 games with no time to play.  But it kept hammering in my mind, like a drumbeat:  ps2.  ps2.  Ps2.  PS2.  PS2.  PS2!  PS2!

Then I found Jesus.  This Jesus saves souls from the abyss of video-gaming.  Not the bowling alley Jesus, the guy called Metal Jesus, because Metal Jesus Rocks on YouTube.

This video review made me feel like I wasn't going coconuts.  Metal Jesus delivers a 10 minute SSX retrospective, covering the game that launched on the PS2 and defined that console for me.  Everything MJ says is right on.  SSX was fun, SSX Tricky turned up the heat with the tracks and celebrity voices, while SSX 3 is a masterpiece that will never be duplicated.  The game play, tracks, tricks, and most of--the soundtrack--will never be equaled in another snowboarding game.

MJ not only delivers an opinion that I totally love, it's the same opinion as mine.  That's why I love it!

MJ also gave a great overview of the Need For Speed series.  Did you know that NFS is the 5th best selling series of all time and sold 100 million copies?  Wow.  I love it, MJ loves it, the whole frackin' world loves this series.  At least until it went all Nitro.

I played each one of these games that MJ talks about, from the PC games to the PS1 and PS2.  NFS: Hot Pursuit 2 on the PS2 was a great one, and the clips that MJ showed justified my back-purchase of the PS2 even more.

More retro coolness after the break...

For the past two years at Comic-Con, Sony has teased us with news & videos on the upcoming DC Universe Online, which will finally get released this November 2010.  Some of the reports on game play are mixed, saying the action was too repetitive and not a lot of fun.  It is definitely a big challenge to pull off a super-hero game, but this trailer is superb.

This little 6 minute movie will delight any hardcore DC fanatic.  You’ve got the Justice League up against a squad of super-villains for an apocalyptic showdown.  Superman and the other characters are rendered with some bits of Jim Lee’s style; the best touch comes from Superman’s eyes blazing red with his heat vision.  Batman wears an armor that looks like a Lee design as well.  There’s a Terminator vs Wonder Woman skirmish that makes you want to see a longer version, and a Black Adam vs (Kyle Rayner) Green Lantern.

No idea what this means to the actual game, but I think the trailer proves something.  A computer animated super-hero film or TV show, played straight in the DC Universe has the potential to be very exciting and true to the source material.

Did anyone else but me see a nod to All Star Superman here—when Clark emerges from the sun?  Nuff Said!

I bought Borderlands (XBox 360) yesterday, popped in the disk at 11pm thinking I'd play an hour before going to sleep.  When I stopped it was 1:30am.

This game is irresistible if you loved the loot-gathering of Diablo and you get off on the kickback of a gun firing.  The enemy AI leaves something to be desired, but the gun combinations are terrific.  I got a pistol last night that fires incendiary bullets and a grenade mod that splits your grenade up into separate little mini-grenades.  This is only just the beginning, as I'm only at Level 7.

Jeff Gerstmann's review of Borderlands on Giant Bomb really convinced me that I would love this game.  I like to play games mostly on my own, and this game works well either single player or with friends.  A number of critics detail Borderlands good vs bad points, but only Gerstmann accurately described the crystal meth level of addiction that Borderlands can inspire.  Nuff said.

BTW, Fanboy Radio fans will be pleased to know that Oliver Tull is the voice of the Soldier character, delivering funny lines like "Now that's what I call a head shot!" Nuff said.

See More DC Universe Online Screenshots at IGN.com

We all know the development on DC Universe Online is taking forever, with no firm release date yet (sometime in 2010).

I was hoping that either Champions Online (PC only right now, XBox 360 coming later this year) or Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 would be worthy enough to tide us over in the meantime.  Alas, both games have mediocre reviews, with the theme generally being "more of the same, nothing new here to see".  I think the Marvel game is still worth playing, but I will wait until the priced drops to $30 or less.

Given the excitement that Green Lantern has generated over the past few years, how far will the DC game go to incorporate the GL mythos?  We've seen screenshots of Sinestro in his yellow uniform.  I wonder if you can create a bad guy and make him a member of the Sinestro Corps?

Surely the DCU game cannot have Red, Blue, Sapphire, or Indigo Lanterns?  Those are too recent.

Can the Flashes go so fast they become the one with the Speed Force?  Probably not.

Too many questions.  I hope the game will be released in the first quarter 2010.  Nuff said.

This fan event for DC Universe Online was held last month at San Diego Comic Con 2009. The video below doesn't show you anything of the game--just the crazy, wonderful fans who came to eat ice cream and get Jim Lee's autograph on a poster. I can sympathize with one fan who said he had been waiting three years and would buy the game right now!

There's a woman dressed as Mary Marvel (good version) and several DC characters (Wonder Woman, Vixen, Batman, Catwoman) dancing in the room. Greg Miller from IGN is pretty wacky. Nuff said.

Here is a demo of DCU Online, now called an "action MMO", taken at San Diego Comic Con 2009.  The video is a walkthrough and the actual game screen is in the distance, but the description of the game is interesting.  Solomon Grundy helps the playable character defeat "patient zero", a character infected by a mutant virus.  Still no firm release date for this game!  Fall 2009 belongs to Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2.  Nuff said.

Here is a demo of DCU Online, now called an "action MMO", taken at San Diego Comic Con 2009.  The video is a walkthrough and the actual game screen is in the distance, but the description of the game is interesting.  Solomon Grundy helps the playable character defeat "patient zero", a character infected by a mutant virus.  Still no firm release date for this game!  Fall 2009 belongs to Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2.  Nuff said.