Tag Archives: PS3

Dynasty Warriors: Gundam Review

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It’s time to look at another Dynasty Warriors game. It hasn’t been so long since I beat the last main title so now it’s time for a spinoff. I’ve owned the Gundam game for a very long time and did complete two of the Arcade modes a while back. I never actually reviewed it though so I went in and did another one for the review. It definitely still holds up as an excellent game and there’s a world of difference to me compared to the mainline Dynasty Warriors games. Even the gameplay itself just feels a lot better which I’m not sure is because of the character models or for Gundam they had a higher budget.

So there are two different story modes for the characters. One is the classic story which is based on events from the TV show. Then you have the original story which is the crossover epic. The crossover story involves a planet that is heading towards Earth. If it lands that will naturally result in the destruction of both planets so Amuro is ready to put a stop to this. Char has arrived and is asking for help. Can Amuro really trust Char to help him save the world or is this all an elaborate double cross? Either way the stakes are high and so Amuro really doesn’t have time to worry about this. At the end of the day he has a world to save.

The story is pretty basic outside of the main premise. You see all of the characters from the other series but we don’t have any big interactions with them or any of that. I haven’t seen the Gundam shows yet but you do at least get the general feel of their personalities. It’s sort of like a tribute to the fans but I would have liked some more bantering. Part of the fun with crossover games like Marvel vs Capcom is seeing these little interactions/potshots at each other. It’s hard to say who my favorite Gundam character is at the moment but I did like Heero here. He was all about attacking and attacking until the enemy goes down which is a pretty good plan if you ask me. You can’t win by playing defense so he made some really powerful points here. All the characters look pretty fun as expected though.

The gameplay as I’ve already hinted at here is a classic 3D Beat em Up. The idea is to take over portions of the map to weaken the opposing army. After a while their general will come out and the goal is to defeat him. I recommend taking over as many parts of the map as possible, but you do want to be careful not to overextend yourself. In Co-Op this becomes pretty easy because you can split up and each take over half of the map. When you’re on your own you just have to remember that a lot of your allies are fairly weak and will be destroyed pretty quick. Fortunately you don’t typically lose the mission on account of that. If someone specific has to live the game will tell you in the victory conditions page. I recommend looking at this page before every mission. It’s always good to know exactly how the fight must go to win or lose so you know who to prioritize.

At its core I think that’s why I really love beat em up games. On the surface it looks like you’re just an overpowered fighter taking down armies, but when you drill in to the specifics it’s really about learning how to strategize. Unless you lower the difficulty to easy you’re not going to have time to help everyone. In these games you’re highly encouraged to follow the plan of attack. If you deviate then you’ll probably lose a lot of allies. A lot of time you have to keep zipping around which will even mean retreating at times because the bosses take quite a bit of time to defeat. If you make the wrong choice you may end up losing. Your character is a lot more formidable than in Dynasty Warriors which helps you deal more damage to the army, but even here I did have to retreat and regroup a few times. I also appreciated the fact that the A.I. here is a lot better than in Dynasty Warriors. They actually assist you in a meaningful way which I was happy about.

As for the graphics, they are definitely high end as you would expect. The robots all look good and the explosions are definitely pretty intense as well. The level designs are also really great to look at. I particularly like how they incorporated space into this as one level in particular actually has to fighting in the vast unknown. That’s certainly not something you would see in a normal Dynasty Warriors game for sure. There are also some full cinematics that play through the game which all look very good. The various Gundam designs are all pretty unique and it’s fun to see them engaging in battle. The soundtrack is fairly large and works well. Admittedly you won’t hear it a whole lot as you’re blasting through everyone but it’s there all the same. The themes are suitably intense for the big moments and will give you the energy needed to clear these levels.

For replay value the game has quite a lot of it. Each story mode should take you a little over 2 hours. You can multiply that X2 for the characters who have both stories and then there are around 20 characters or so which makes for a lot of levels. You can also work on maxing out every character to improve their stats and gathering the items. All of this will take quite some time so you really won’t be running out of content anytime soon. There’s simply way too much to do and it’s part of what makes this game the complete package. The company clearly put quite a lot of time and effort into this one which keeps on holding it up as one of the best beat em ups.

Overall, If you like a good beat em up game then you’ll love this title. The gameplay is very smooth and there is a whole lot of content to absorb here. Each of the character attacks are different enough where you’ll see the benefit of switching things up. I can definitely say that the sequels are higher on my list although right now they seem a bit overpriced so I’ll hold off on that for a bit. Playing as a Gundam is just a lot of fun because of how many attack options they have as well as the stage backgrounds. It all feels very high tech and sci-fi which has really held up over the years.

Overall 9/10

Little Big Planet 2 Review

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It’s time to look at the second Little Big Planet game. I played the first one a while back and wasn’t particularly impressed. I found the story mode to be rather boring as nothing really happened. Platforming gameplay is fun enough but I do need some kind of story or at least bright graphics to get me through. The first game’s gameplay wasn’t the sharpest and the backgrounds weren’t amazing either so that left me in a spot. Fortunately the sequel greatly improved on all accounts and actually ended up being quite solid. I was impressed with this game and now I can actually say that I look forward to playing the third when initially I scoffed at the prospect.

Sackboy is thrust into another big conflict here. Some dark dragons/overlords have begun kidnapping powerful people and conquering multiple worlds. Sackboy must now team up with a comedian, an old man, a queen, a fighter in order to take these guys down. Sackboy may not look like the most intimidating character in the bunch but he has the power to interact with anything and he’s got a lot of determination on his side as well. He won’t be going down easy and with his friends at the ready maybe they can actually make a real change here. He won’t know until he tries so Sackboy is ready to defy all odds and get started here.

First off the fact that this game actually has a real story nearly blew me off my chair. I was pleasantly shocked to see real cutscenes with voice acting and everything. The story even has an epic feel to it with powerful opponents and a lot of scary designs. The purple monsters are excellent and they all look quite evil. These aren’t kid designs or anything like that, they’re just going in. The worlds all have pretty unique designs and gameplay strategies to them as well which is good and there’s a reasonable degree of difficulty here. This is a platformer that is actually trying quite hard. There was a lot of time put into this one.

The main gameplay is that of a 2D platformer. You run and jump past obstacles as you get to the end. There are a lot of extra details and mechanics at play here too though. For starters you’ve can grab onto objects which helps you jump across large gaps. You also throw objects to block some flames or throw them into enemies. You lead mini Sackboys over obstacles as well. Then you’ve got the possession levels where you use a stuffed rabbit or cat to blast your way through levels. There are also levels where you take control of a bee and these are basically sci-fi ship levels. You have an energy blaster and it’s all great fun. I wouldn’t have minded if we got more aerial levels like that. The important thing though is that the game succeeds in all of its different gameplay variations. They’re all pretty fun and well polished.

Graphically the game has come far from the first one too. The first game felt more experimental in a lot of levels as it would have odd looking live action graphics and things of that nature. This one still keeps some of the more disturbing imagery but it’s toned down to a great extent and feels a lot more mainstream. That’s definitely the way I like it and while it’s still not on the level of Mario or Kirby there are some really nice looking moments. The enemies and the final world in general are good examples of that. The soundtrack is a lot more forgettable though. There are no tunes from the game that I even remember.

The length is fairly reasonable for a platformer. I’d say it took 5-6 hours to complete. It’s definitely not the longest title out there but you don’t really expect games in this genre to be all that long. It’s mainly all about a quick experience filled with a lot of creative levels and fun times along the way. The main question is if those levels were fun and engaging to which I can confirm that the title did a good job with this. I was certainly kept well entertained throughout which was good. There also is a good amount of replay value to be found here even if the online may not be operational anymore. You can still collect a lot of items and complete side missions too.

Overall, Little Big Planet 2 brings in every element that I had wanted to see from the first game. It’s a big improvement in every sense and this may be the most improvement I’ve seen from game to game in a long time. If you like platformers then I can completely recommend this one to you. It’s good fun and while some parts of the game can be challenging I don’t expect you would be stuck for long. The final boss is probably the only part of the game that didn’t seem to be designed all that well. The fight just takes too long and there is a ton of waiting here since for most of the fight he is invincible. Eventually you defeat him but it’s a lot longer than it is difficult.

Overall 7/10

Ghostbusters: The Video Game Review

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Time for another film type PS3 game. This one got a lot of hype since it plays out as a sequel to the original Ghostbusters films which is pretty cool. It’s nice to get some extra closure for the characters and it feels nostalgic right off the bat. The main character doesn’t add much but it gives the others an extra target to talk about so that works out well. It’s a very fun game and I can see why it ended up getting a remake. You really can’t go wrong here.

The game starts with the Ghostbusters hiring a new guy to help them out. It’s been a bit of a tough stretch lately with the mayor hiring someone to keep an eye on the team. (Peck) Peck really doesn’t like the Ghostbusters and aims to run them out of town even if it means losing his job. I guess you have to give the guy credit for persistence because that’s really taking his job to the next level. I feel like a lot of other guys would have quickly faltered once their job was on the line. There’s no time to waste on him though as more and more ghosts have been appearing around town. Looks like the Ghostbusters are going to need to bring their A game here.

It’s nice to see fan favorites like the Marshmallow Man making an appearance here as well. He makes for a pretty intimidating boss in the early levels. The plot is solid and the main villain finally fighting himself instead of summoning more monsters was certainly impressive as well. The game gets to go all out with the supernatural aspect this time around as the characters go to different dimensions and the ghosts really mean business here. All of them are pretty fun even if the romance bit doesn’t really work out so well. I think the gag should have ended with the main character failing once again. The guy was persistent so getting one last rejection would have been perfect.

The game has pretty strong writing throughout as we get quite a lot of solid banter. All of the characters have an answer for everything and they’re constantly bringing up the past to try and mess with each other. You can really see how they are a close knit group that has been through a lot. They all make fun and stuff, but at the end of the day end up helping each other out. It reminds me why we need a proper third Ghostbusters film. Not what we’ve gotten lately. Hopefully the new one is good, but the focus on the kids is an early red flag.

As for the graphics, they’re definitely quite good. Like Terminator Salvation this is a very cinematic heavy game. It feels like an interactive movie to an extent as the story keeps going and you throw in your guns to blast away at the enemies. The gameplay is like your typical shooter only with a Pokemon capturing thing thrown in. The goal is to capture the ghosts in little devices that you carry on hand and then you keep it moving. The game also has various detective portions of the level where you have to find the ghost or solve some kind of mystery. For that you have a pair of goggles that let you see the invisible things in the air. This may sound like a lot, but you’ll quickly master the controls.

You can also buy upgrades for your various guns. By the end of the game your gun has 4 modes. The ones you’ll be using the most are the ooze version and the standard laser. All of them have their perks though. Then the game has a great soundtrack with the iconic theme showing up every time you hit the main menu or lose a life. It helps you not feel so bad about losing because otherwise it is a bit of a long loading screen. Throwing in a fun little song like that was the way to go for minimizing how long it feels.

In terms of length this is another short one at around 5 hours. There are a lot of collectibles to grab and monsters to scan though. If you’re aiming for the Platinum and have to grab these then the game’s play time should likely double for you. There’s a good amount to do and the price is still quite low here so it’s a good investment. What else could last this long and be this cheap to buy? There is also one puzzle that can be a bit tricky so if that ends up stumping you then you may end up being here a little longer than you would have expected. It took me around 10 minutes before I cracked it. In terms of difficulty you shouldn’t have any big problems although one level near the end with fire owls crashing everywhere was tricky. I definitely lost that one quite a few times before being able to take them all down.

Overall, Ghostbusters the Video Game is a solid experience and I recommend checking it out. It’s one of those games that just flies by because of how much fun it is. The characters all act the way they do from the original show and the gameplay is solid as well. Your A.I. partners may die quite a lot so you end up having to carry but that’s fine because you are the new recruit so it’s to be expected. I’m certainly down for a new Ghostbusters game. Building off of the story in this one would work quite nicely.

Overall 7/10

Terminator Salvation Review

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It’s time to look at a PS3 game that I’ve been meaning to buy for a very long time. Terminator’s always been a pretty fun film series and it makes for solid games. Who doesn’t want to try and save the future from the Terminators right? This one is especially well known because it’s supposed to be a pretty easy Platinum trophy game and it’s quite short. It is a shame that it couldn’t be a bit longer, but I thought the game accomplished a lot in the time it had. It feels like a cinematic experience and had more cutscenes than I expected.

The plot of the game follows a man named John Connor. He is the child of destiny and has always been targeted by the machines. One day he decides to finally take more responsibility and heads into a war zone to save some men who have been trapped. The army believes this is a suicide mission and doesn’t follow him so right now it’s up to him and one lady who accompanies him. Can they possibly travel across a vast city in search of these survivors without getting destroyed by the opposing armaments? It’ll be difficult but John is ready to try.

It’s a very enjoyable story. It’s been quite a while since I watched the film so I don’t know how closely it follows the plot, but the game at least did a good job of building up the characters and the world. One interesting thing here is how much of a threat the Terminators are. They don’t appear very often as you usually fight drones. When they do appear you really can’t try to fight them in the open field. They will drain your health away almost instantly with their fast machine gun shots. It’s nice to see them as such a threat because in the films it is usually very difficult to defeat even one of them. They have grown a bit weaker in newer films as the humans can take some of them down, but in the originals you just weren’t going to win. The final level of this game even puts you in a position where winning is nearly impossible.

I actually died the first time in this level because I tried to beat them at the end. The trick is instead to run to the nearby chopper and that cuts you to the ending. If you stay and fight then you die and that’s the overall message of the game. You can’t stay and fight every time. Sometimes you just have to beat a hasty retreat. Espionage is heavily focused on in this game. You hide behind cover and then take shots in order to guarantee success. The mechanics of this are pretty solid. I like to just run in and shoot but the game makes that almost impossible to do. Your best bet is to hide behind things and even then the game can be a little difficult at times. If you pick the wrong route then your only route left may be the death screen. You have to really think about every move you make before you do it.

The best weapon in the game is easily the rocket launcher so I recommend having that on hand whenever possible. Usually you don’t see this weapon very often in the game so save your few shots for when you are in a really tight spot. I liked to save it for when I would actually be fighting a humanoid Terminator. They are easily the trickiest opponents to fight and the rocket only needs 2 good hits to take them down. Otherwise I used a shotgun for most of the game. You’re allowed to carry two weapons at all times so those were my two. There are other good weapons to be sure, but these are the two that really worked out quite well for me.

The graphics here are quite impressive. This is a PS3 game with a lot of effort put behind it. It doesn’t feel like your average movie tie in and is more like a AAA title. The backgrounds look nice and while the game does get a little too dark at times, I believe that is more due to my TV having that issue as opposed to it being the game. The soundtrack is also good with all of the usual Terminator themes you should be used to. You can beat this game in around 5 hours or so and the only replay value is to beat the game again on hard to obtain all of the trophies. The game won’t last long but it goes back to quality vs quantity. It’s short but you’ll feel like you got your money’s worth.

Overall, Terminator Salvation is a great game. It definitely exceeded my expectations of what I was expecting here and I would rank it pretty highly among the others. My favorite is probably still the third Terminator game since I really liked the combat system there and it also adapted one of the most exciting movies which doesn’t hurt. Still, if you’re got 5 bucks to spare then this is a great game to check out. You’ll really get to learn how to play a shooter game very carefully and the skills should transition into others. Before long you’ll be a pro at the ole run and gun style.

Overall 8/10

Ghostbusters: The Video Game Stats and Records

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Stats time!

PS3 Trophies 24/51

Level 1

Artifacts 2/6
Ghost Scans 1/6

Level 2

Artifacts 0/6
Ghost Scans 0/6

Level 3

Artifacts 0/6
Ghost Scans 0/10

Level 4

Artifacts 0/6
Ghost Scans 1/11

Level 5

Artifacts 0/6
Ghost Scans 1/6

Level 6

Artifacts 1/6
Ghost Scans 0/6

Level 7

Artifacts 1/6
Ghost Scans 1/10

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07 Review

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Time for the next golf title. This is the final one that I own so I feel like the golf marathon will be over just as suddenly as it began. It’s still a pretty peaceful game and I dare say that I had more fun playing it than Baseball. Perhaps it’s because it’s less of a structured match here so I could just hit the ball around. I mainly played a bunch of the minigames and did some practice mode this time. I lost all of the games which was unfortunate since I was super close to winning one of them. Ah well, can’t win am all right?

When the game loads up it drops you into what’s effectively a normal match by yourself. You can whack the ball around for a while and practice on your swings. After that you can hop onto the main menu. I spent a little time here having fun even though I kept firing my shots into the lake. It looks like you can switch clubs and direction when you’re hitting the ball. Which club you use will determine how far you hit the ball and eventually you should be able to understand which club you want to use. I was getting the hang of it a bit, but at the same time most of my shots were still hitting trees and such.

After that I jumped into the minigames, but to be honest most of them were basically the same thing. You have to shoot at these rings in a lot of the modes and the goal is to get the ball in the ring. The closest person to the ring after each shot claims it. Whoever claims 5 first gets the win. The funny part with these was that even the computer didn’t know what to do. The two of us kept missing the shots over and over again. Eventually the CPU won, but it took an extremely long amount of time. Considering that this was the main minigame, I’m surprised it wasn’t programmed to do better shots. I have a sneaking suspicion that it scales down.

I think that because in a different minigame the goal was to hit 3 shots towards the flag and the closest wins.(You can see how all of the games start to play the same way) Well, I got startled or something on my first shot and hit it way out of bounds so the opponent won that round. Then I hit a hole in 1 and the computer matched my effort. I gotta tell you, I was feeling pretty good about that hole in one until he matched it. How do you match a shot like that? I should have been running away with the lead by this point so you can imagine that I was a little disturbed. If you ask me there’s no way that the CPU should have been even close to matching me.

So I lost all of the minigames. Still, it was fun to play them all. I think the best part about the game is how fast everything loads. I never felt like I was stuck anywhere for too long. When hitting the ball I liked seeing my player’s facial expression as he would quickly start to panic. He had a look of dismay about him the whole time which I thought was pretty neat. It shows up every time you hit the ball and the little animations that pop up each time are great. They really make the whole thing feel a little more realistic and presentation like this is nothing new for the EA crew. They always hit it out of the park in this regard. The graphics are just very good throughout. Everything is on point and you wouldn’t guess this was a game from back in 2007. At most the humans might look a little blocky but the atmosphere is everything you could possibly want in a modern game.

There’s definitely a lot of replay value here since you can keep on playing the golf matches over and over until you get better at them. While the modes are all pretty similar, there are still a lot to choose from which is important. I have always believed…and still do, that all sport games should have a lot of replay value. The whole point of sports is to keep on playing and playing so why should that change anytime soon? I think the only counterpoint for the golf game’s replay value is that you could buy a newer version for basically the same price so there isn’t a whole lot of reason to get this one in particular. It’s a very fair point.

Overall, Golf games aren’t really my thing. For me they work best when I don’t play it as a golf game and just play for the scenery. There’s something really calming about just hitting the ball and watching it soar. I think it’s due in part to the graphics but also due to the sound and interface. You just don’t feel stressed out playing the game and I think that’s definitely a good thing. It’s the kind of thing you want to see when playing any game because then you can really get back into a recreational spirit. If you’ve got a buck to spare then this is a good game to check out. If you don’t…then you’re not missing a whole lot.

Overall 5/10

NBA 2K7 Review

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It’s time to look at one of the oldest 2K games out there. It’s certainly the oldest one that I’ve got. Right away you can see how retro the game is and it’s actually quite a lot of fun. It makes for a good change of pace and feels a lot more like the classic arcade style or NBA titles. Of course that doesn’t stop the computer from basically making every shot as expected. It really does feel like they are all stars while you’re playing as the normal joes.

Naturally I went into a quick match to gauge just how good of a fight I could put up. Turns out that I wasn’t quite ready for these guys. I kept it close for the first 3 quarters but eventually their slight lead got larger and ultimately it was a decisive loss for me. My guys would just miss easy shots and gradually that would cost me since the computer seems unable to miss unless they are going for a 3 point shot. The computer was even able to save for the ball many times to scoop up the rebound while my guys would hang back.

Still, I think they did a good job of adding a lot of cool animations and mechanics in this game. For one, being able to literally dive into the ground to grab the basketball is pretty cool. That’s not really something you see very often but in the 2 games I played I got to see it numerous times. Then you’ve got the “assists” where you’ll shoot the ball and another player will try to help by getting a hand on it and pushing the ball through the hoop. I remember seeing that quite a bit when I was watching the NBA Finals so that’s a nice touch.

In general the game is just a lot smoother than the newer ones. You can just run up and down the court without worrying about all of the extra mechanics. On the other hand, the gameplay is a lot more slippery as you lose the ball quite easily. I probably knocked the ball away 30 times, even if the computer was always quick to grab it back. Playing defense is more fun here than in later games so that’s definitely a plus. Defense will never be as fun as offense, but the closer you get the better.

In the second round I managed to keep it close for a bit, but then they started steamrolling me again. This time I wasn’t able to last til the third quarter, I’d say that after the first half it was already out of control. One thing about basketball is that it’s very hard to make a comeback. Once you see that the team has a considerable advantage in the score you start trying riskier techniques which makes the gap grow more and more. There are people who say that there is no sport more boring than Basketball when it turns into a blowout. That’s definitely a little exaggerated but I will admit that it isn’t nearly as fun once it is so one sided.

Of course the graphics are pretty solid as always. The screens are very clear and there is a lot of attention to detail here. The colors are pretty sharp and the character models are detailed enough where you can really see the resemblance to the real players. The soundtrack is less impressive though and basically just serves as background noise. Finally the presentation overall is definitely impressive. It feels looks like you’re watching a real game and simulates that pretty well.

In terms of replay value this game is basically limitless as always. You can have a good time for as long as you want since each game is different and doing a franchise will give you access to an incredible amount of matches. There are also other modes like practicing so you can improve your fundamentals. No online of course but if you’re buying a 2007 title that almost goes without saying. You’re likely just buying this game to see what it used to be like so you won’t be disappointed. The 2K series has come a long way. It may have traded in fun for realism, but at the end of the day only marginally so as I have enjoyed all of the 2K titles quite a lot.

Overall, NBA 2K7 is definitely a great game to check out. It’s got a lot of hype basketball action in it along with solid graphics and good fundamentals. It’s a game that has really withstood the test of time and ages incredibly well. It’s just as fun as it was when the game first came out and if anything you may enjoy it even more now after playing the newer titles. It’s quite different and reminds us that Basketball can always be presented in a new way.

Overall 8/10