Battlefield: Bad Company

Bad Company, like Fallout 3 before it, has absolutely dominated my Xbox for a while now so I might as well review it. In fact it's been a while since a multiplayer game has been so addictive...

The Battlefield franchise is hardly known to be a bad one. There have been loads of installments around for a long time, varying quite a lot with each one. The latest, instead of taking place in a real war eg. Vietnam, World War II is more similar to Battlefield 2, with a modern day war going on (only with the Chinese replaced with the Russians).

The single player campaign was not a bad experience, while it lacked in variety and a lot of features that FPS games need to really rise above other games of their ilk, it had many things hard to find in a lot of today's games. One of those things is decent, light-hearted comedy throughout. This is hardly to be expected in a war game, it has been pulled off very well, and as well as making you laugh it shows you that war is not always doom-and-gloom, to many it is just a job they have to endure for the sake of money - or in the case of these guys, getting out of trouble by serving their country - and that they will make light of it to keep it bearable. The characters have been made purposefully rememberable; anyone who has played the game through will be able to remember that Haggard is the dim-witted redneck who enjoys nothing else than blowing everything up, Sweetwater the bullied nerd always fighting with Haggard, Redford the classic tough black guy who doesn't care to joke around, and your charcter, Preston who plays the timid new guy who just plays along. In this way it works very cinematically and really pulls you into the storyline, however basic it is. The environments won't vary hugely but the destruction physics of the game really turn anywhere into a battlefield; walls will be blown to bits by rockets and grenades or crumble from heavy vehicles smashing into them, trees will collapse with impact, and all this is both hugely immersive, and brings a little more tactical approach to fighting with cover not being an infinite life-saver any more; so the trick is to keep moving. Another thing which I found made the game very immersive, though not usually a hugely important point with games, is the audio. I don't even mean the soundtrack; guns sound so incredibly life like that people should be forgiven for thinking a mob war is going on in your bedroom, explosion will make your ears ring and reloading has never sounded so satisfying.

Keep in mind that although the campaign isn't perfect, everything good about it is used in multiplayer, and THAT is close to perfect. In my opinion, CoD can suck it, THIS is the ultimate army shooter. Battlefield is known for its huge maps and large scale battles, and I find it hard to describe how much fun this is. The game type is Gold Rush, one not yet used in the Battlefield series and it's a lot of fun. There is a defending and an attacking team: the defenders must protect the gold by killing all the attackers, and the attackers must destroy four pairs of gold crates before being wiped out. This can last between 10 and 30 minutes and although it doesn't sound like a realistic warfare experience, the atmosphere certainly is. You have to use tactics and teamwork, and there's an armoury of vehicles and class upgrades that can be used in different ways to help your team. All this goes towards one massive, balanced multiplayer experience which you'll find yourself playing for hours on end. Don't pass up on this, this is one of the best multiplayer games I've yet seen of this generation.

Negatives for Bad Company have mainly been noted already, the campaign could have been improved with some different mission types (hate to say it but they could have taken a leaf out of CoD4's book and done a sniper mission) other than just the ordinary formula and one helicopter mission. It also didn't have co-op, which I think it really should have, it being a squad-based storyline, and it would have topped off the multiplayer brilliantly. Graphics also weren't diamond, even if the colour scheme made the environments beautiful. There's also something which stops it being an all-time 'best game ever' type, perhaps because of the rather generic modern warfare genre which can be improved and improved, but perhaps never perfected - though I suppose that's not what Modern Warfare fans say...

I give Bayyyyyyddddd Company an 8/10. It hasn't got everything but I would say anyone who does online gaming should buy this and give it a go, even if you're not an age-old fan of the Battlefield series. You'll be getting at least 30 hours out of this and I doubt very much you'll regret it.

Assassin's Creed

Assassin's Creed is a real love-it-or-hate-it in the gaming community; although it is constantly criticised with the claim of being hugely repetitive to the point of considering suicide, it also is one of the biggest games to represent this gaming generation, in the same way Halo 3, Metal Gear Solid 4 and GTA IV have. It's a game everyone's bought or at least played and despite this it's still hated on.

I'll start with what I think really excelled in Creed. Let's be honest, even if as a whole it didn't offer an incredible gaming experience, the idea it is based on is fantastic, and the potential it had is huge. It's not your average Splinter Cell-type stealth assassination game (no discredit to Splinter Cell, it's a good franchise) and it really takes this genre of game to a new level. You don't have to silently walk through shadows, needing to wait for minutes on end for your target to get close enough for you to grab him and drag him into shadows. If you're seen, you're not instantly overwhelmed by a million enemies much stronger than you. No, you play the role of an actual medieval assassin; you take down your enemy wherever he is, even if he is in the middle of the street. This makes the whole game much more intense, whether you're trying to get him in the middle of a crowd so smoothly no one notices, or when you're being chased at full speed through streets or on top of buildings, using the incredible freerunning mechanic to hop from building to building, and climbing houses, mosques and churches. In this way, the game has been made superbly. The framerate is just about perfect, and every action is smooth as silk. The sword fighting is also a high point, and when you get good enough there's nothing like having a huge brawl with twenty guards on top of a building, elegantly dodging their attacks to return with graceful thrusts, and throwing others off the edge with gleeful satisfaction.

The game progresses with a variety of targets to be taken down to slowly reveal the secret of a Templar gem. The storyline really didn't capture me at all, as the cutscenes are really one of the parts that could have been worked on. They're hardly even cutscenes, you just stand in a room (you're able to move about and change the camera angle but that's it, you can't even skip them) listening to your contractor talk about who's next. The dull voice acting doesn't help...

This is where the reptitivity cuts in. To take down one target you need to scout out the area to find out more about him, this includes interrogating certain people, helping out an informer by killing someone for him, pickpocketing and eavesdropping. Sounds ok? It won't when you have to repeat this whole process for every single target in the storyline. Being an assassin during the Great Crusade is a great concept, but I'm sure assassins didn't go through an exact routine of conveniantly available recon missions before every victim was taken out. Needless to say this brings down the whole game to mediocrity I find; Ubisoft shouldn't have been so damn lazy when this could have excelled.

A final point to make is that this, as well as being an action/stealth game it's also set in huge sandboxes, as there are a few cities that you visit throughout the game: Damascus, Jerusalem, Acre and Masyaf (this is not really a city but a castle that the assassins operate from). Once all of these have been explored there is, in total, a huge area to work in. However, there is nothing to do! I'm not saying it should be an RPG but apart from the main missions that you HAVE to do, you have only to tediously find flags dotted around the place, and that's only if you're really desperate for the achievements (even I didn't lower myself). Finished the game? Well good luck having any fun apart from killing some guards, or civilians if you want to be a bastard.

I give Assassin's Creed an overall 6/10. It could have been absolutely amazing, as the combat and stealth was perfectly balanced, but horribly let down with easily avoidable traits.

Worms II: Armageddon for XBLA

Well Worms being a gud 'un for the old XBLA, it could only be expected that the second would do nothing but improve. Worms is quite good at making sequels seeing as usually they can do nothing but get better (due to the simple format of the game) with new guns, equipment and maps. Fortunately, this does not disappoint.

Because Worms uses a back-to-basics, pure fun approach to gaming, there isn't much to say about what's better about WII:A. Imagine Worms, with its multiplayer (Live and Local) and its singleplayer modes, but made better in whatever ways possible. The number of weapons has roughly tripled, and the campaign is longer, now including 'challenge' missions where you have to use your wits and knowledge of all the weapons to get your worm from one side of the map to the other, and your team is now so customisable they can have loads of different voices, hats and gravestones to choose from. Thankfully for Team 17 they've had a whole history of Worms games to nick used weapons and stuff from to put in this remake.

As for negatives, there aren't many. The challenges can sometimes get a little bit too close to impossible, they can at least get you stuck very easily. It would also be good to get some other game type than just deathmatch (I know it can't be that easy with just a mapful of Worms and weapons, but SURELY something) would be good, just something original I guess. Other than that I think it's fully worth the 800 point and sets a good standard for arcade games. 7/10.

Fallout 3 DLC (PC and Xbox 360): Point Lookout

Would you look at that, I actually just wrote a review for Mothership Zeta (the next expansion) without realising I hadn't even written one for Point Lookout first. I amaze myself sometimes.

Point Lookout, being after Broken Steel had quite the tough act to follow as Broken Steel not only added to the storyline but raised the level cap, changing the game experience altogether. Yet Bethesda do another DLC which branches off from normal play?

This DLC is focused more on chills and horrors, which previously the game hadn't done the best job on. Have they now added a real spooky factor to Fallout 3? No, no they haven't. It's not bad and I don't find it lets down the expansion at all, but I don't think Bethesda should have even bothered. It goes for the swamp-horror theme which isn't all that scary in films as it is, and quite frankly it's hardly noticeable. Oh well...

I must say, the storyline wasn't the worst they've had but it was hardly memorable. Some ghoul's being attacked by some ridiculously tough humans (Tribals) and you have to save him, and then find out their objective, then help out said ghoul in his little feud with his sworn enemy. It's not a terrible storyline and it even has moral choices for you to make (both brilliantly immoral anyway, in true Fallout style), so its not in this department where Lookout falls. It's also definitely not in the environment; it has the biggest exploration area of all the Fallout DLCs and varies brilliantly, from the dusty boardwalks to the murky swamps and forests. Search hard enough and you'll find some exciting side quests, which I greatly enjoyed. You'll also get the Bog Walker achievement for finding all the locations, if you needed more incentive. So Point Lookout does a good job in RPG traits.

However, where we were promised new weaponry and enemies, we get less than hoped. There are a couple of new weapons, mainly very redneck-y, eg the Double Barrelled shotgun, and as good as they look and feel they're virtually useless against the rediculously tough enemies. And no exceptions. Every new enemy in Lookout, from the Tribals to the weird mutated-hillbilly things has a huge health bar and you find yourself needing to run backwards and fire everything you've got endlessly with every hostile you encounter, not to mention use every stimpak you've got (of course, this can all be solved by changing the difficulty to Very Easy, but then you might as well be playing Viva Pinata). Bethesda might be trying to make this DLC more of a challenge, but there's something called 'overkill'.

I give Point Lookout a 7/10. It's expansive, has good side quests and the storyline isn't bad, and despite it being a little too hard it's an ideal for expansions.

Fallout 3 DLC (PC and Xbox 360): Mothership Zeta

Sorry my choice of pics wasn't exactly great...

Bethesda have FINALLY finished their quintet of Fallout 3 expansions - confirmed to be no more made - with a hugely unexpected turn. While the others focused on post-apocalyptic life, and the way I see it, things which were at least believable, this one breaks all boundaries and goes to space, into a stereotypical alien spaceship, classic green aliens and all. Did the risk of it being laughably stupid pay off?

In a way, yes. Mothership Zeta isn't a disaster. The game doesn't stop being Fallout 3, and everything stays in the usual format despite being somewhere completely ridiculous with ridiculous enemies. You keep your weapons and armour so it's effectively just exploring a new area with quests in it, though these quests seriously lack substance and the general storyline is incredibly weak; it's literally 'Damn. We've been abducted. We need to get back to Earth. Let's find a way back to earth.' You meet a few characters along the way, eg a cowboy and a samurai which the aliens had been keeping whilst studying humanity's history, but they don't reveal much about their back story and hardly add to the expansion as a whole. The environments aren't great either and get repetitive very quickly, and unless you're a real sci-fi fan you'll be begging for the Wasteland by the end.

Enemies hardly vary either, they're all aliens: some with helmets, some with energy shields and some normal, or robots. In this way, Zeta suffers in the same way The Pitt did. It's basically one big dungeon crawl, fighting a bunch of enemies, hitting a switch then repeating the process. New weaponry spices it up a little, but because of no hidden things to find (other than the Captive Recordings to collect making the MOST FRUSTRATING FALLOUT ACHIEVEMENT EVER) which all RPGs should have there isn't a great deal of excitement to be had along the way. So this also has the problem which Operation Anchorage had: too much focus on it being an FPS.

So Fallout didn't exactly make a joke of itself with Zeta, and the 'spaceship vibe' was successful, but it wasn't a great deal of fun. I guess this is a disappointment, as it's the last expansion of the five, and none of them managed to be outstanding, with Broken Steel being the best of the lot. I give Zeta 5/10 for another FPS-like experience which did bring some variety with the whole extra-terrestrial thing, even if it was pretty underwhelming.