Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood (PS3/X360, 2010)

I love Assassin's Creed 2! That game does it all. It starts you off at birth, and takes you near the end of Ezio's story. When they announced Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, I was sceptical. Great, I thought, they are doing spin-offs already. After playing some of Assassin's Creed Bloodlines on the PSP, I've seen how non interesting that can be. Then, they announced online multiplayer. This is a HUGE pet peeve of mine. I can't stress enough, that not all games need online multiplayer!!! Dead Space does not need multiplayer, Resident Evil does not need multiplayer and above all else, Assassin's Creed REALLY doesn't need multiplayer. I decided, I wouldn't purchase this game, on grounds that I'll wait for Assassin's Creed 3. After all, to me, Desmond Miles is what the Assassin's Creed series revolves around. Altair and Ezio from the first two games, were just parts of the story and I felt they were done.

Well, that was all well and good, until the game was about to come out, and all of the critics were raving about how great the multiplayer was, and how the single player campaign itself was actually greatly improved. My love for Assassin's Creed 2 got the best of me, so alas, I went out there and got it. One year later, the wicked Assassin's Creed Revelations trailer made me feel like playing it. Here's how that went.

Assassin's Creed Brotherhood is in no way shape or form better than Assassin's Creed 2. Assassin's Creed 2 from start to finish feels like something special, while Brotherhood feels like something extra. They added a few neat features, like being able to call in assassin's to take care of enemies at almost any time, but the game just reeked of being a cash grab. The narrative, which is something this series has been really going above and beyond on, is very much a secondary thing too. Here's the summary of the plot. Those darn inbred Borgias are bad...lets make an army of assassins to stop them. Only in the last minutes does this game do anything interesting, by taking a large step in the story of Desmond, leading to a cliffhanger ending.

If I was ranking this game as an average game, I would say it's pretty good. It definitely is. However, it has to be judged on the entire Assassin's Creed series as a whole. Brotherhood, to me, felt pretty half assed, and lacked the excitement of the previous two. Sadly, though, this disappointment doesn't end there.

Multiplayer in this game is abysmal. I tried hard to get into it, being a fan of the Assassin's Creed controls, but somehow they took those controls out and made it into a yawn inducing game of tag. You want to fight someone else? No can do, you just get to tap the kill button. Oh no, someone is trying to kill you. Do you try to fight back? Nope, the game won't give you the option. You need to run away. The whole thing felt a little too situational for me, and so I was only able to stand through 3 full death-matches before shutting Assassin's Creed Brotherhood off, forever.

This game really hurt this series, and if I didn't buy Revelations before playing through Brotherhood, I probably wouldn't have bought it at all. I only recommend this game to people who need to see where the storyline is going, otherwise Assassin's Creed 2 will give you all of the joy you'll ever need from the series, for under ten bucks.

This is not nearly as fun as it looks.

Spare Parts (PSN/XBLA, 2011)

I picked up Spare Parts a while back because it lured me in with a few key words that always grab my attention: couch coop and Simon Pegg. If there is anything I love in this world, it's hanging with friends, playing a game...in the same room. This game offered it, and only cost 10 bucks so I figured 'why not?'

The story is pretty unimportant but charming. You play as two robots who, on a deserted planet find a talking space ship (voiced wonderfully by Simon Pegg) who crash landed and needs you to find his missing parts that have been scattered all over the place. There is also some bad guy in space who decides to try to destroy you. They don't really go into that part of the story at all, but of course you have to thwart his evil ass in the end.

Early on, I had to say, this game was horrible. In particular the platforming was the issue. Trying to jump from one place to another without just falling to your death was nearly an impossibility. Fortunately it looked like the game designers discovered that fact and made it so you can never die. Ok, you die, but you just reappear a few feet away from where you die and continue as though nothing happened.

The combat is pretty standard, though it does eventually degenerate to tapping the attack button over and over again, which gets pretty tedious. There are also a few puzzles to be found in the game, most of which are a matter of pushing something somewhere or sticking your hand in a device. Not too much innovation to be found anywhere. The only thing that kept this game afloat until the end was that the designers managed to come up with a really fun and easy going personality for the game. A personal favorite feature of mine is that, if you are low on health, just face your partner and if you both double jump in the air at the same time, you will do an epic air high five and restore some health in both of you.

The game was bland and pretty much completely underwhelming, until later in the game when you get some rocket boots. That's when it got moderately enjoyable. Flying around the screen, even if only temporary was quite a bit of fun. I also enjoy that you are able to upgrade your various action parts, like your power punch or rocket boots. Alas, the upgrades hardly make any difference.

Overall, the game isn't great. I wouldn't even call it good sadly. At 10 dollars for a 4 hour long video game, I can't recommend it...unless you like trophy or achievement hunting. It's pretty insane for that. Hang in there Simon Pegg. You'll find better games to be in eventually, I promise.

I love this man!

Top 5 for 2011...sorta

2011 was a remarkable year for games. So much greatness came out, so here is my list of the top 5 best of them....

That's what I was hoping to say by now, but truth be told, for me 2011 was a year of playing catchup. I played dozens of games that have been sitting on my shelf for years. Whether it be Disgaea 2 (which took a lot of time) or going back and playing Dragon Age Origins again, I kept busy. So, instead, I'm gonna show the world the  games I haven't yet played and feel that I need to play before I can make the top 5 list.

Dark Souls - Demon's souls was the best. I played it through many times since it came out, and I'm sure I'll play it again. My best friend keeps coming to me raving about how satisfying Dark Souls has been for him. I'm pretty jealous. Soon my friend...soon.

Skyrim - Yeah, everyone loves Skyrim, but my Skyrim is even better than yours. My beautiful girlfriend bought it for me. Not for Christmas either. She just wanted me to have it. I know this game is a huge deal, so don't worry about it. I'll jump on it soon.

Uncharted 3 - I'm working on this one right now. The fact that this hasn't made very many top 5 or even top 10 lists is blowing my mind. I'll be writing a full review of this one when I'm done with it.

Infamous 2 - After the pure lust I had for the first one after playing it, I need to play this one. I can't wait to hover around over buildings with lightning power! So much fun. The only question is, will I be a superhero or a supervillain. Right up my alley!

Gears of War 3 - I'm sure it looks like I only play PS3 games, but that's not true. I also play good Xbox 360 games. Sadly, there aren't so many these days. As of now I'm at the beginning of act 3 of this bad boy and I'm eager to finish it and discuss it in great detail. I am playing this one in split screen coop with my best friend. That's how we have played through the whole series thus far. I enjoy that.

and finally...

Deus Ex: Human Revolution - This game just looks too great not to be playing. As I said, I played a lot of catchup this year. A large part of that was playing the hell out of the original Deus Ex. Though it is dated severely, I was thrilled with many of the design choices. I can't wait to see how this series has evolved in all of these years.

So, rest assured, I will get to it...but with both Skyrim and Dark Souls on that list...it could take a bit. I also really want to play Dragon Age II (despite the reviews). It's gonna be a busy year of gaming, and I'm a lucky man for being able to experience it. I also want to note, that while the new Zelda looks really nice, I won't play it, because I hate using the wii controls. No matter how I try, I don't enjoy swinging my arms around to play games.

Tomb Raider: Underworld (PS3/X360, 2008)

The saying goes, that you can't judge a book by it's cover. This is usually a truth, however, can the same be said about video games?

I give you exhibit A. Tomb Raider: Underworld.

What does this cover tell me about this game? There are no brains... The entire thing is cashing in on the chesty protagonist's body...there are guns in it... that's pretty much it. Sadly, that sums it up perfectly.

This game was recently given away for free via the Playstation plus membership. Ooh boy...was that overpriced. This game is a train wreck.

Historically speaking, I have never been able to tolerate the Tomb Raider series, due to it's archaic control schemes, terrible camera angles and dull combat. To make matters worse, I've always found the stories and dialogue to be written as though by a terribly stupid person, who was trying to sound brilliant. By the way, the British accent hasn't helped with that.

So, what exactly is wrong with this game. First off, you'll notice that the old school method of control has been kicked out. This is a good step. Back in the day, you would press the up button to move forward, no matter which way you were facing. It was stiff and terrible. Many games used to do this, but thankfully that went away. I figured that now that I could actually move the character around easier everything would be fixed. Unfortunately the game saw fit to make the camera brutally destroy everything I tried to do, by trying to zoom in on...or inside Lara's curvaceous buttocks. Believe me, this isn't as awesome as it sounds. There were instances where I could only see her feet at the top of the screen because the camera lost me. There were moments (every 15 seconds or so) where I would get stuck partially in a wall and I'd have to tap all of the buttons until I rolled out of the 'death trap'. 

Shooting is another fundamental game play disaster. You can't actually aim your weapons...at least not accurately. It auto aims only. So basically, just keep tapping the "auto aim" button and shoot at stuff. Don't even bother looking at it. It's lazy. It's not like Uncharted: Drakes Fortune wasn't out when this game came out. Heck, Uncharted 2 was halfway completed when this game came out. That's just sad.

Graphically, the game isn't too bad. It looks pretty neat, and takes you to lots of interesting places. I have fallen through many great looking floors, via glitches.

The story is negligible, with an evil version of Lara showing up to...shoot and kill an important character and burn down her house. That's a pretty big thing right? Not really. The plot advances and Lara reacts to all of this like she just dropped an Eggo on the floor. Then again, it's very hard to believe in the seriousness in the story with Lara is talking to her 'cool black friend' named Zip, and her right arm is sticking through her torso and out from her left underarm for the entire cut scene. Apparently no one tested this game at all...

A great way to sum up how much of a let-down this game is, is to describe the "kraken" in the game. So during the very first mission, Lara stumbles upon a badass giant kraken, just laying in water minding his own business. So, instead of having a fun battle or anything ambitious at all (seriously Kratos would jump in that water and wreck that kraken.). We get to climb around the room (what we've been doing the whole time anyway) and release a chandelier to fall on its head and kill it. Did I mention that the kraken is just hanging out the whole time, minding it's business? Hooray Lara! Kill that endangered creature! Fuck biology!

There is a lot to talk about when describing what is wrong with this game, but nothing sums out it's failure like the new Tomb Raider reboot coming out soon. Apparently someone realized that Tomb Raider could be better than it is. The time of big boobs selling video games is (hopefully) over. Tomb Raider in it's current form can not survive. It's time to bring something unique. It's time to adapt to modern gaming. It's time to realize that a woman can't swim as fast as a shark...

This game blows. I'm gonna go play Uncharted 3.

The McDonald's breakfast conundrum

Everyone, on some level, loves McDonald's breakfast. For me, nothing starts the day quite like a Sausage and Egg Breakfast Biscuit, a hash brown, and about 12 large double double coffees. The way I see it, as long as you aren't doing it every day, it's not bad for you...

So today, after getting my cholesterol checked at the hospital, I decided that it was time to eat something more healthy. Not really, instead I flipped my cholesterol the bird and went to get some delicious Rotten Ronny Breakfast. They serve breakfast until 11 and it was 10:40, so no problem there, right? Today I want to address something that I know everyone has at one point experienced. We have all at one point craved the deliciousness that is an egg mcmuffin and realized that it was too late to have one. Well today, I learned that "we serve breakfast until 11" means, we serve breakfast until about quarter to 11. The girl at McDonald's even acknowledged that it was quarter to 11, but they decided to stop making stuff. I witnessed, not 1, but 3 cars drive away from the McDonald's drive through today, because they decided to stop early. My question is this. Is breakfast really such a hard meal to make? Tim Horton's can make breakfast until noon, maybe it's time to compete. With McDonald's making great coffee these days, you would think that competing with Tim Horton's is a part of the business plan. Then again, what can you expect, when your CEO looks like this guy....

"Smug son of a bitch"

This pissed me off so much, that I refuse to eat at McDonald's for the rest of week...it's Friday...that should be doable. Uh...I need a hug.

Why limit your cinematic joy?

I am not a film snob. Let me make that clear. I love great movies, but I also love fun movies. For fun I decided to look back on recent orders from Amazon to see my odd methods of purchasing Blu rays.

Most Recently, I ordered The Seventh Seal (Criterion Blu-Ray) and...The Expendables... seriously.

Prior to that I ordered 8 1/2 (Criterion Blu-Ray), If... (Criterion Blu-Ray), The Fountain (Blu Ray) and.... The Gamera Trilogy.

Why am I telling you this? I want to promote being a non snobbish film viewer. It's ok to enjoy a guy in a rubber turtle suit beat the snot out some other monster while towering over Japan. Just because you can appreciate great cinema, doesn't mean you aren't allowed to enjoy the little things. I'm not saying don't hate movies though. Just don't hate movies for being less intelligent than movies that people respect.

For the record though, Godzilla movies are the best! Godzilla vs. Destoroyah is damn fine cinema!

Much love!

Two PandaPack videos I always hated.

I watched these two videos that we shot a few years ago again today. In the past, they were videos I didn't enjoy, but somehow today, I can honestly say I enjoy them.

I present thepandapack 1 year anniversary special. (in two parts). This is the final instalment of the ill fated Panda Pack.

Happy 2012 people.