Ultimate Spider-Man sucks

*Sigh*... may as well just lay it out in the title.

I bought Ultimate Spider-Man (Xbox) used from EB Games awhile back.... I think I got it as part of a "2 for $20.00" sale. I sure hope I didn't pay more than $10.00 for this turd, anyway.

I've had it sitting on my shelf for so long.. looking for something to follow up the mostly great experience of Super Mario Galaxy, I thought I may as well try it out.... I really wanted to like this game. Yes, it's made by Treyarch, the Activision-owned developer that made Spider-Man 2/3 and probably Spider-Man 1. I've only personally played Spider-Man 2, and that game also bites.

You know when devs make the EXACT SAME GAME over and over and over again? I'm sure it happens with [sport title]:[whatever year], Madden 2009 for example, or NBA 2009, etc. I'm not into sports games, so I don't know if they're good/bad, but I always wonder why someone would want to buy the exact same game over again every year...

Except this is EXACTLY what Treyarch does with their Spider-Man games. Sure Ultimate Spider-Man has a slightly different look to it: more cel-shaded, more comic book cutscenes. but the gameplay itself is NEARLY IDENTICAL to Spider-Man 2, and from what I can tell, all the other Treyarch Spider-Man(1 & 3) games. There should be a law against making the same bloody game 4 times over, and expecting people to keep buying it. Actually, there is a word for it-- fraud.

All of the same problems from the previous Spider-Man games show up in Ultimate Spider-Man. There's races and "get to here before the time runs out" missions, and they're STUPID because as cool as the webswinging & climbing mechanic is, IT IS NOT NEARLY PRECISE ENOUGH to do these missions. You get so little time to get into the ball that's nestled in this stupid corner that it's impossible to even get into because you keep jumping off a wall when you're trying to stick to it.... and of course they pad out the game by making you repeat the same missions over & over to artificially extend the gameplay. Instead of, y'know, adding legitimate content.

After about 1 hour of play, I've had enough. This is the same crap I endured trying to accept that travesty known as the Spider-Man 2 game, it hasn't gotten any better. It makes me so mad, because the game basics are really cool. Spidey does swing around nicely, the overall look is good... it just all falls apart in the gameplay.


I can only hope that Activision lost a lot of money with the Spider-Man 3 game, and with even more luck for us gamers (if there was any justice) Treyarch will get shut down & never make another Spider-Man game ever again. I'm sure that's just too much to hope for.



later
don

Counter Force - shovelware

So I popped Counter Force into my Wii last night.

Yikes.

I expected bad. But this is *bad* bad..... I thought it might at least be fun in an arcadey way.... the problem is that it's pretty hard to even see the enemy to shoot at. And then there are collisions with the backgrounds.... overall I can't tell when I'm being hit or what. It's just a big mess.

from Wikipedia:

The term "shovelware" has more recently been used in a more general sense by video game reviewers to indicate any product of disappointingly low quality due to a lack of time and effort by the developers. The Nintendo Wii and DS have often been criticized for having many shovelware titles, with producers hoping to make money with the large success of the consoles at the expense of creating quality games.

I feel bad for paying money for such obvious shovelware. I know that we should not be supporting the making of crappy, quick cash-grabs of broken games, especially for the Wii as it's drowning in shovelware as it is.... those of us who know better have a MORAL OBLIGATION to try to stop the support of shovelware as best we can. Usually this only means voting with our wallets & not buying that crap.

I noticed a lot of shovelware comes from one particular publisher, Conspiracy Games. Check out their roster of games.... EVERY ONE is a shovelware title. They're all the ones I see in the bargain bins at Wal-Marts and other big box stores.... they're usually seductively-priced at under $20.00. I bought Counter Force for $10.00.. and I STILL paid too much. Because honestly, how low of a price is low enough for a crappy game? There is no price low enough.

I can't help but compare Counter Force to another quick & dirty title, Star Trek: Conquest. That game also has limited modes & production values; there's no 2 player, and really not much more than the basic game. But despite it's low production values, Star Trek: Conquest is just dumb fun. I'm going to give Counter Force a bit more play, but I doubt I'll really warm to it. May as well use it as a coaster.



later
don

PSP watching: Miami Vice, United 93

I haven't been using my PSP all that much over the holidays... I did play a bit of Jeanne D'Arc, but RPGs are pretty slow paced.... I have to admit my Wii has been getting the most attention (even before I got Super Mario Galaxy)

But I have been watching some movies on my PSP, trying to clear a backlog of junk that I've collected & need to delete. I watched 2 movies, both camera copies.... which I'm going to avoid in future. That's just no way to watch a movie, the quality is such crap.

Miami Vice... was enh. Might be better had I watched a better quality version. But overall, it didn't live up to one of Michael Mann's best movies, Heat. Still, I was really taken by the final song in the film, Mogwai's Auto Rock.

Then I watched United 93. I've been putting off watching this one for awhile. The subject matter is so heavy. And it's emotionally draining to go back to the events of 9/11. It's such a sad story, but really, this is a story of pure heroism. These people are just going about their daily lives when they're confronted by such pure evil, in a way that they never really concieved. We all knew of plane hijackings, even terrorism, but nobody could have predicted this. And the passengers of this flight rise up to the challenge, knowing that they will probably die, not only to try to save themselves, but to prevent further death of others. It's too bad that this heroism seems to have been forgotten in the history of 9/11.



later
don

2009 video game resolution - pay less for games

If 2008 taught me anything about videogames, it's that I don't want to pay full price for the majority of my game purchases.

May 2008 was the killer EB Games "Games Days" sale, where they had massive markdowns on 1 or 2 games for just about every console each day of the sale. I picked up 3-4 Wii games, 1-2 DS games, and 1-2 PSP games for $10.00 each.

And that's about how much I want to pay for games. My sweet spot is $20.00, but $10.00 is my snap-it-up price if it's a game I'm at all interested in.

For 2009, I want most of my game buys to be in the $20.00 or $10.00 range. A few games I will pay full price (or close to it)... I know I will when Loco Roco 2 (PSP) comes out in Feb 2009. I'll try to wait for a few weeks to see if it goes on sale, but if it doesn't, I'll pay.

It's just that even 1 full price game will set you back over $50.00. That's a lot of money for only 1 game. If it's one of the best games you'll ever play, it's totally worth it. But the chances of that are statistically very low.... there are too many crap and overrated games coming out in this current state of the industry.

What I want this year:

Kirby Superstar Ultra (DS) --got it (???)2009
*Loco Roco 2 (PSP) --got it Feb. 10, 2009 ($24.99)
Star Wars Clone Wars Lightsaber Duels (Wii) --got it Oct(?)2009
Boom Blox (Wii) -- got it Feb 5, 2009 ($19.99)
House of the Dead: Overkill (Wii)


What I am possibly interested in:

Resistance Retribution (PSP) --got it March 30, 2009 ($34.99)
*The Conduit (Wii)-- got it March 24, 2010 ($24.83)
Moon (DS)
Okami (Wii)
No More Heroes (Wii)
New Super Mario Bros (DS) --got it Aug, 2009 ($29.99)

*= I'll pay full price for it.


Notice how most of the games on those lists have been out for awhile already. I'm hoping that they will drop to my sweet spot in pricing this year (in the case of No More Heroes which is already at the $20.00 mark, obviously I don't want to pay more than $10.00 for it.)

The problem with waiting for the $10.00 deals is that rarely is it something I was totally searching for. In 2008, the best $10.00 deal I got was Star Trek: Conquest (Wii) because out of the $10.00 deals I got, it was the game I most wanted. I still play the hell out of it.



later
don

after the perfect game

Ever played a really really great game... one where you're enjoying just about every minute of it? And you almost don't want it to end; you don't want to finish it because it's been such a ride.

Eventually, you DO finish it, and maybe go back to it for some replayability. But at some point, you have to move on... on to the NEXT game.

But what is the next game? And can it live up to the experience of that last, near perfect game?

I'm pretty close to wrapping up Super Mario Galaxy. There's a lot of content to the game, a lot of extra levels... so there'll be ones to go back to. But for the most part, I think that most of the real fun to be had has been squeezed out of the game. It was such a pleasant surprise to find it such a great game.

But now I'm wondering, what should I play next? I have 2 Wii games from the Boxing Week sales that I haven't tried yet: Raving Rabbids T.V. Party and Counter Force. I figure I'll be popping in Counter Force & giving that a spin for awhile. I expect it to be not great, but hopefully a "so bad it's good" type of experience; just cheesy on-rails mech action fun.

One thing I've noticed about playing games one after another is that timing & order is key. A few times I've played an awesome game only to follow it up with a mediocre one... and I know I would've enjoyed the mediocre one more if I hadn't played an awesome one just before it. There've been times where I played an mediocre/ok game, had fun with it, then the next one is awesome, and was grateful I hadn't played it first since it's so much better than the previous game that I enjoyed-- not knowing that I had a better experience to compare it to.

The thing is, I can never really know what's going to turn out to be an awesome game and what's going to disappoint.

In this case, I think playing Counter Force will be such a change of pace that I will have fun with it.... but it's never easy at the end of "finishing the perfect game"..... what's next?




later
don

Super Mario Galaxy

Wow. As mentioned, one of the games I bought during Boxing Week was Super Mario Galaxy. Paid $29.99 for it... Super Mario Galaxy got glowing reviews, but I was skeptical because I find that major game franchises from *ALL* the companies to be largely overrated. Part of what's broken in the video game industry is obviously the companies-- console makers, publishers and developers-- but a significant part of it's brokeness also comes from the poor quality of so-called video game journalism. I expected Super Mario Galaxy to be a bit of a letdown like MarioKart Wii was.

What a surprise though! This game is really fun and addictive! I'm very pleasantly shocked by how much I'm enjoying this game. I really want to like the platformer genre of games, but rarely do I find games that are balanced & not just "you can't get over the 18th firetrap, so you can't go any farther in the game. May as well throw it away now."

Super Mario Galaxy has its share of frustrating moments to be sure, but there's still a lot to love about the game. The levels are really nicely designed, you walk around on planets that are small as a house, so you're upside down a lot. For the first couple hours I found it a bit... not queesy, but I wasn't sure how I was going to like it. But after I got used to it, it really adds to the fun of exploring, not only the topsides of worlds, but the undersides & insides too.

The overall look and sound of this game is really great. The basic gameplay reminds me a lot of Lego Star Wars. I like Lego Star Wars, but Super Mario Galaxy is like a better version of those games. Unfortunately, because of the static camera in a 3D world, Super Mario Galaxy suffers from much of the same camera issues Lego Star Wars did... some parts of the game are harder than they should be simply because the camera gets in the way.

Everything is very bright colourful, & cartoony, even the lettering exudes a certain charm (though more voice work would be nice....) Coupled with music with sounds that range from a stirring cosmic themes to what sounds like a Vienese Waltz... it's just a really nicely designed game world. Very kid-friendly looking/sounding game. Playing it, however, is *not* kid-friendly... there are some tricky areas & some of the tolerances for the challenges are so low that there's NO room for ANY error, which I hate. I don't play video games 20 hours a day, 7 days a week, and I don't want to have games designed for people who do. They went out of their way to make this such a kid-friendly looking game that I wonder why they made it largely inaccessible to those very kids they seemed to be targeting it at. We'll see how it goes when/if my nephew tries it out.

But I personally found the difficulty curve to be not too bad. The levels are not too short, but they aren't too long either. You'll navigate some tricky platform challenges & you usually won't be expected to endure tons more, usually you'll get there. Most of the checkpoints are good. You start with 4 Marios, it's fairly easy to get more... but I found that after getting 20 Marios, when I saved + turned off the game, next time I played, you start back with only 4 again. Like I said, it's easy to get more.... even though Princess Peach is kidnapped, she manages to send you a letter with 5 1-ups included. It's just having a limited amount of men is an archaic & outdated formula of video game design.

There's a lot of content to the game, lots of levels, called "Galaxies" here... and there are secret paths that lead to other levels.

Super Mario Galaxy is definitely one of the Wii's flagship titles. I'm glad I bought it. I keep going back to it for "just one more level"... which is a sign of a great game.



later
don

Jennifer Hale interview by UltraNeko

UltraNeko posted a nice 10 minute interview with actress Jennifer Hale.

I'm a fan of Jennifer Hale's sexy voice work from cartoons & video games... I first remember her doing the voice of Felicia Hardy (Black Cat) from one of the Spider-Man cartoon series. But then I started recognizing her voice from games I was playing.

The final minutes of the interview, Hale gives a couple demos of her voice acting, and if you close your eyes & imagine the characters she's doing, she's actually quite an impressive voice actress! I knew the sexy stuff, but I bet she does a lot of voices I never recognize.



later
don