The personal site of Christoffer Radsby

Gaming Monthly: October 09

Thursday, October 1, 2009

This month is a really sweet month for gaming, less sweet for poor people like me without a job. We’ve got all these developers releasing really awesome games, and I’ll be having a lot of trouble even playing them. It’s a hard life, I wish someone would hire me.
Oh well, here we go.

Operation Flashpoint – Dragon Rising [2009-10-08]

The developers of the original flashpoint game has already had their release this year with the game ArmA II. The game had decent reviews but still lacked a user-friendly interface and controls. This game however is being developed by Codemasters, which means the game will probably have a better and more user-friendly interface, as well as better graphics/story and multiplayer support.

The game itself is a modern themed first-person military simulation set in Japan on an island called Kiska.

The game has an impressive draw distance of 35 kilometers and visual effects like fire, smoke and dust are simulated based on the weapon used. A 2.000 pound bomb will throw up dust and smoke that can be seen from far away and fire will create fires that will burn for some time. The most promising aspect of the game is the multiplayer mode where players can play through the campaign together or play different mp-modes.

If you’re a military nut, you should probably check this one out, I know I will.

Risen [2009-10-09]

I actually already posted some stuff about Risen in Gaming Weekly: W40, there are some people in the EU that already have gotten their games. I will probably buy the PC-version of the game since I’m a fan of the Gothic-series.

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves [2009-10-14]

Ahh Uncharted 2, this game is probably the release of the month. Sweet singleplayer-mode, a fun co-op and an awesome multiplayer-mode. What’s not to like? I bet you guys already know a lot about this game but I’ll brief you guys on the game anyways.

The game is an action-adventure in the spirit of a manly Lara Croft, even though Nathan is funnier and way cooler than Lara. The game picks up a couple of years after the events of the first game and the game revolves around another unsolved historical mystery. This time around it’s about Marco Polo and his doomed voyage home from China 1292. He departed with several ships and 600 passengers and arrived a year and a half later with only one ship. Nathan is of course interested in the potential treasures and sets out to find some. The story deepens when Nathan finds out that Marco Polo was hiding a much greater secret.

We all know that the game is a graphical marvel, both in visual effects and animation. You should really “check it out“.

Brutal Legend [2009-10-15]

Jack Black awesomeness, this is a game where Jack Black voices the main character. It’s an instant buy when the sexiest man and gamer on the planet empowers a game with his sexy voice. Too much sexy? Oh well, this game is an action-adventure game developed by Double Fine Productions and published by EA (EA is on top of things lately). Tim Shafer, the game’s creative director, was inspired to create the game by his own past musical experiences and the result is Brutal Legend. It’s about the roadie Eddie Riggs (Jack Black) who was transported to a fantasy world inspired by the artwork of heavy metal covers.

The artstyle of the game is amazing and it’s been a while since we’ve seen games looking like this, I like it.

Borderlands [2009-10-23]

This might be the second most anticipated game of this month, Borderlands is sci-fi first-person shooter with RPG elements and is currently developed by Gearbox Software known for their half-life expansions, and Brothers in Arms games. The game is hyped because of it’s four player online cooperative play, where players will be able to customize vehicles and their characters for different purposes. The game has around 160 quests to be completed and varies in length and complexity. 30 of these are story quests and the rest are sidequests which allows for a promising replay value. The game will also feature a game-mechanic similar to Diablo’s random level generation system, which will influence mainly the weaponry seen in-game, but also to a lesser degree the in-game world an map. There will be a lot of action, a lot of quests, a lot of loot and plenty of leveling to be experienced in this game.

The game takes place in a world called Pandora, which is a giant open world. You take up quests, kill things, talk to NPCs and earn experience to level up and above all LOOT THINGS!. Gearbox said themselves that the game will have anywhere from a few hundred thousand to over one million guns in this game. That’s quite a lot, and I really hope there will be an achievement for acquiring them all, that would be hardcore.

This game will probably be the Co-op game of the month, “check it out” and save up your money for some cooperative action.

Forza 3 [2009-10-23]

I actually haven’t got much to say about this game since I didn’t finish the previous game. It was actually a bit boring to get into for my taste, a bit to slow since the series is focused on a pure simulation experience. For all of those with the love for simulation racing Forza 3 should be something worth taking a serious look at. I’ll probably hold off for Gran Turismo 5 to dust off my G25 racing wheel.

Tekken 6 [2009-10-30]

To be or not to be the king of iron fisting, that’s the question. At the end of this month we’ve got the release of Tekken 6, which is an arcade fighting game. I’m not really hyped over this one, since the last 2 games have been all the same, I did enjoy Tekken 4 for the Ps2 though, so I guess it could be worth taking a look at, but I’m saving my money for games that will actually keep me playing.

Overall

It feels like a really good month, I’d put my money into the cooperative games first and foremost, that means that Operation Flashpoint Dragon Rising, Uncharted 2 and Borderlands will probably be on my shelf one way or another by the end of this month, and since they are cooperative games I hope they will end up on yours as well.

Oh yeah, Left 4 Dead recently released DLC , so check it out on Xbox Live later. Right now we have got 5 cooperative games to play for a LAN-party at the end of the month, that’s pretty awesome. We might have to extend the LAN-party time from three days to five.

Tags: Gaming monthly