Just enough Cause to Keep Playing....

I am sure everyone is excited about the swinging, grappling, monstrosity ( I say monstrosity in the lightest and best way from the sprawling map), but I am trying to find the will to keep playing. Do not get me wrong it is hilarious grappling a jeep to a statue and watching the poor vehicle inhabitants learn a few things about physics, or grappling the 100th sniper so he falls to his cold hard death but it gets a little bit samey (Trust me it does).
There are a few problems with this game such as when you start out the map is BIG and I do not say big light heatedly, the map is so expansive that when you reach a milestone like 60km driven it actually FEELS like you have drive 60km, or nearer to 100km to the amount of time you spend just driving about. There are alternative means of transport, but I find grappling to peoples cars erratic as it normally;y causes them to crash, hilariously with me on the back if I am not quick enough to grapple off, or they just drive TOO SLOW. You receive the opportunity to also receive an extraction, but this is only to set places on your discovered areas, and the map the extraction provides is not the same map which contains your missions, meaning that you have to basically guess your drop point.
I also have a massive problem with the story as it is not very engaging, the characters are 1 dimensional, with either silly accents, or gimmicky props (Evidence pt. 1 Sheldon's continuous pork fetish). The story is like a snore inducing 007 story where they have tried to make twist and turns in the story but they have basically failed to even peak my interest one little bit. I feel that this generic story is not fitting for a modern game where stories have become so elaborate, and movie-like that I feel almost spoiled by recent titles such as Heavy Rain.
I must say there are good points, one of which is closely associated with one I have just whined about. The landscape.... it is gorgeous and just goes on forever, this is one of the reasons why the expansive map is probably there to show off the draw distances this game can crank out its like being in a plane at about 10,000 ft and thinking you can see half way across the world.
Dying, and destroying things in the most imaginative way, this is how games should be. Creating memories to share in which you either kill yourself in a way which would win you a Darwin Award, or destroy a building, a landmark, or a vehicle in a way only Mr. Bourne would know how to do. A great example of this was on a level where you were required to destroy some satellites before they reached orbit, I am rubbish at flying Jump Jets in this game so i got my better half to do it. He started firing at the infernal thing, and just couldn't get a clean shot (his aim is worse than my nan's without her glasses), so he decided to take a leaf out of the Japanese fighters books and end his life for the greater good, luckily before the £million jet collided with the few million pound satellite, he jumped out, and soared to the Earth before opening his chute like a true gentleman. It was so slick I thought I saw Rodrigo ( I have re-named the protagonist to something more fitting), light up a cigar at least 20,000feet and I was so proud, like a mother whose child has just performed her first piano solo at the Royal Albert Hall.
I wish I wasn't so critical about this game because if you want a wham-bam-thank you mam game, well this is it. It is a fun filled experience where you can basically create your own world one explosion at a time, the landscapes are lush and expansive, and I should really go back to it and spend more time just admiring the scenery, not trying to hurtle from A to B. The only gripe I do believe is that the story is weak, it reminds me of a game which is basically a one trick (grappling hook) pony, for some players this may not be enough as we have moved away from the days where games like bionic commando rule supreme.

Rating:
Gameplay: 4
Graphics: 7
Overall: 6

Who ya gonna call??.....

the game is keeping tight to the original with look and humour

The original and the best

I have realised that I am going to try to get a nice chilled out game so decided to go all 80's and play a smattering of ghostbusters: the video game. So you enter a wold where two forms of media collide, with voices provided by veterans such as Bill Murray, Dan Akroyd, and Harold Ramis, you are sure to get fully immersed into the game. The graphics although cartoony, embrace the jokey side of the ghostbusters franchise, and potray all the stars true to form. The little things love is the attention to detail, from talking to Gozer in the fire-station, to the little quips Ray makes about you being a newbie.




The strange thing about ghostbusters is the PKE system you use, to investigate spooky areas, and to initiate 'fight' sequences. This made it reminiscent of Project Zero (fatal frame), a game which caused me a few sleepless nights, and for that reason it scared me slightly. The fight sequences, took a little getting used to, the array of weapons you should use for each enemy was a little hit and miss, and getting knocked back as soon as you look in your PKE got annoying. Although I was one of the ghostbusters, I often fund myself alone, or with one other member, who was just fodder while I waited for my guns to cool down. This makes you play a more cautious game where you try not to keel over, as there would be noone to pick me back up, and dust me off. I f you haven't heard the story of the game it follows the ghostbusters in the early nineties when Gozer comes back again to stir up trouble for you. You are a new 'buster much liek Winston was in the first, and they treat you as if you are 'very wet-behind-the-ears'. There are cameos from some famous baddies including slimer (remember even though in the cartoon he was a good guy, he was a mini villain), the grey-lady (the librarian), and a mysterious sugary treat (I will let you guess who). I am nearly finished, but I am finding the game a cute mix between a puzzler, a fps, a comedy adventure where you buy big guns and can have bigger laughs. I reccommend this game to young and old, who are novices and experts to this franchise, and are getting ready for their new film which I hope will be out soon.

Pros: Big guns, Lush Graphics, Recognisable voices, faces and enemies, Crossing the streams, Cute quips.

Cons: PKE monitor, Getting smacked over the head while looking in a PKE,Getting told for the 20th time not to 'cross the streams'


Score: 7/10

Assassin's Speed

The other day I looked at my PS3 game collection, and realised that although I have only had my PS3 for a few short weeks (3 in fact) that I have accumulated a large amount of games (Dante's Inferno, Aliens Vs. Predator, Ghostbusters, Heavy Rain (aka Hard / Solid / Dense Rain), Assassin's Creed 2, Resistance 2, Bioshock 2) and have only completed 1 to completion. These games do not demand my attention as ,much as PC games do, and so I can put them down to my hearts content, and pick them up again when I want (this is excluding Dante's Inferno... I am really into my Greek mythology, and religion at the moment, and also Heavy Rain). So I decided to play one of my other games and write a little review of it, as I now have completed it... 1 week later, although this is better than the 1 night that Heavy Rain took. The game I decided to lay and write about is Assassin's Creed 2 as I loved the first one, even though its restrictiveness was a bummer. If you haven't played the first one, you start of in an alternate universe present in a facility owned by a maniacal company Obstergo. You are given the mission to travel in the past to relive your ancestors past in dream-like sequences using something called an 'animus'. So you toddle off into the past, and I'll have to leave it there because I may be told off for spoiling the game. So lets fast-forward to the second one, where you are rescued by the lovely Kirsten Bell and taken to another 'facility' to re-enact some more of you ancestors dreams. Although this facility is run by your friends the atmosphere is tenser than Obstergo, thanks to Danny Wallace's dry wit, and aggressiveness towards you.



Picture the scene, you are in Italy in the 15th Century where I have a loving family and am a bit of a playboy. Well you can guess what happens next when his family life is compromised he falls into the harms of the assassin's guild with a little help from his friends, family, and Leonardo Da Vinci. As always the Assassin's Creed team, have delivered a top-notch story (sort-of) and has immersed the player in this world completely alien to us, to explore and play around with. With this though, I regret to say the game has decided to create some new limitations, which make me want to play the first one, even one of it's boring eavesdropping missions. As I said I have not had my PS3 for long, but I am a daughter of Playstation, I have been there through all its incarnations, and its six axis differs a small amount to the PS2 controller. So it was strange to me, why I was having so much trouble controlling Ezio, I wanted to jump off a building, he wanted to run up a wall. To be frank, I found the controls counter-intuitive, and for a game based on free-running I find it strange.
To add to this, I found the graphics for this game a real shame. This is a next-gen console and I found the graphics, on par or even worse than my PC offering of Assassin's Creed 1. The characters eyes, and mouths scared me more than a Japanese horror film, when my phone rings. There were just disjointed and ugly, and all I could think was 'what a waste'. I know this was a big game, and the graphics for the scenery was gorgeous, but to not push the boundaries of the PS3 is just a shame, and when done right graphics can take you and keep you in a game.
I have one more gripe, but I can't talk about it, as it is a story related gripe, and I will probably get shot if I reveal anymore.




Overall, Assassin's Creed 2 is a title I would recommend to people who played, and enjoyed the first outing, and wants to know where the story goes from there. If you are not a ticking time-bomb, which I realised I am, after trying to jump off a roof, and again running up a wall, and attaching myself to the chimney it is attached to for the 20th time, this is also a title for you, but be warned this game has magnificent vista, just don't look at any of the characters maybe apart from Ezio and you will be fine.

Summary
7/10

Pros:
Great story, I dived the height of canary wharf into a haystack and SURVIVED!!!,

Cons:
Characters Facial Graphics, Character Control, (SPOLIER!)

Please comment, as I would LOVE to know what you guys thought, as you can probably tell, I am gonna get through my games now, and I think ghostbusters which I will review when I complete it.

A little rant

There is little that I find inspirational in today's society. Maybe this is why I find solace, and joy not with human companionship but with technology, and inanimate pieces of silicon.

You may look at the pseudo stylish society where everything is reliant of your materialistic possessions, and actually everyone else is just something to use to gain them.

I sometimes look at the world around me, and I like the things that I see. I am not stupid, or naive, I know you need money to buy things, and that to buy the things I like and enjoy you need lots of money, but I will not let go of my morals for these things. I will not step on anyone else to become this thing that does not even resemble a human. I know that people around me have feelings which I will not abuse, and will not take advantage of. I will work MYSELF for the things I have and will buy.

I feel concerned by the people I spend time with, I am becoming more distant, separate, and where will I be in 1 year’s time, what about 5 years? I can't degrade myself with people I find despicable, who see no wrong in their own actions. Before you say: 'let those without sin cast the first stone', I am not in the stone throwing business, but I would rather keep my moral fabric in touch than let it degrade before me.

Everyone knows that dodgy things go on at the office, but this is supposed to stop at some innocent flirting, or maybe someone photocopying their backside, but my work is filled with people that just are so out of touch with reality it seems like they are setting up with a life in one of Caligula’s palaces. I think that there is nothing wrong with a little sporadic hedonism, buying something unnecessary is something that is revered where you work all week, miss out on your families and kids growth as a unit. It is not only their throw away lifestyle with their wives, and their kids, their derogatory remarks and their ultimately snobbish attitude, that makes me write this entry. It is primarily their belief that they, and the way they live is the better than anyone else. I would rather wear Primark and eat from aldi than get soaked up with a lifestyle that ultimately will lead to a sad, and quite a lonely existence.

So to any girls who think that they can't have it all, and that having things is better than your happiness and wellbeing, or that you are one of these people that talks about the degradation of society as a whole, then talking about how your wife and your children is a drain, and attaching yourself to any piece of skirt that walks by, please just take a look around, stop this ego-centric thoughts and actions. It destroys the reasoning behind having a better education, and being good at your job makes you a happier person, and nicer to be around.

I was woken this morning by my daily shot gamin podcast. this morning I decided to listen to gamer girls radio. For those you don't know these girls take no prisoners approach to gaming can be a gateway for women to enter the world of games (they need to stop the constant shouts 'leeroy jenkins' though) and not feel that they are a freak or that they are strange.
So they were talking about another site called game politics, this site brings real life information on how video games are affecting society as a whole. So I was a little surprised to see an article cited from my ex-lecturer about how video-games objectify women, this is the same person who I remember took seminars where basically she was doing her casting call for her big brother career she held for a few years. It lacked the sight of someone who has a doctorate in psychology from me, someone who was in their 2nd year of a psychology degree, wondered where her citations to actual research actually were.
So the article started stating that her review was based on empirical research and as verbatim "not an opinion piece," but one constructed from "empirical data from peer reviewed journals".
his is a solid stat, you would think that this report would be laden with citations, and statistics, not something laden with mary whitehouse style derivations that the media uses to criticise video-games. She carries on this torrent by citing something that reminds me of a newer version of Godwins law "Violence against women is often trivialised. For example, in the game Rape-Lay…". There is one thing I know when anyone talks about violence against women in video-games, that is the longer the conversation goes on for more likely a reference to Rapelay will be made, until the probability of this becomes 1. This is a game that you cannot purchase legally from any other country than Japan, and popular opinion is not divided, but united in it's disgust for it (I decided not to include the other reference to GTA as I do not believe its treatment of women facilitates game progression as it does not in any way help you 'complete' the game).
In modern Britain there is a train of thought that video-games are explicitly made for children. THIS IS NOT TRUE. The gaming industry has one of the most strict, and best enforced rating systems in modern media, where retailers of these games score better than other areas in undercover stings by the BBFC.
I like most women do get bored of the multitude of helpless big-bewebed women you find in games, but I also see a plethora of women who will kick anyones behind whether with a gun, sword or even their hair as more and more female gamers / developers are getting in on the action.
As a final comment I do wonder why she is particularly targeting gaming. Everything is getting hyper-real in the gaming world but there are greater offenders of the objectification of women that she seems to miss out. Whether you read the papers or not you may know of the recommendation for airbrushed pictures in magazines / papers / posters to show what percentage has been altered. If you delve into any pre-teen magazine you will find many articles on 'how to please your man in 10 easy steps' or 'get your bikini body before summer'. This is the real problem, where being a woman is not enough if you do not please your man in the process, that you are less of a person just because you can't wear a bikini on the beach.
To end this rant, I also need to add that not only did this woman fail at conducting succinct seminars when i was in my late teens she also was the resident psychologist for 'Big Brother' is there any more evidence that this is not a objective empirical review.
Read the report on http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/documents/Sexualisation-young-people.pdf.

Loving Number 7....

Working in the city does strange things to a girl geek. It might start of slowly like wearing a skirt once a month, but it alters you. This weekend I had a hankering for some nail varnish, and I have been loving Boots' No. 7 shades for a while now. The striking colours, and long lasting finish; have made them a favourite of mine. So after I went to the gym, I toddled of to Boots in Chelmsford with my £5 voucher for No. 7 and Ruby and Millie products.
The inner geek in me was immeadiately drawn to a nail varnish that changes colours when coated with clear varnish. This is nail varnish is perfect to recreate the look from Total Recall where the receptionist in it changed her nail colour at whim.

I am pretty pleased with the result, even though I haven't tried the alternative colour which is pinkish brown.
I do think the gunmetal grey is hot though, and is increasing my city chic points. Anyway I'll stop babbling.... have a look....

MAC + Hello Kitty = WIN!!!!!!!!

I'm so late getting a whiff of this, but I have many friends who would love this.
Hello Kitty is a staple for all those who strive for Kawaii, and this collection is just to add that little bit of cute you require for your makeup bag.


This al-encompassing collection, has some interesting colours, I can see very creamy bright eye shadows, and blushes which not only dont look cool, they look great quality too.

The collection unfortunately disppeared from MAC online shop but you can get it from various online retailers.
Its cool to see the more infantile side of high end makeup, and I will be bagging a few parts of the collection, if only as an add-on to my bags. This an affordable twist combining MAC and an obsession to all things Kawaii which I think should be accessible for people of all ages.