SFIV for the Xbox 360... A new hope? 
Monday, March 2, 2009, 06:31 PM - Xbox
Posted by Caliga
Crisp, clean, and fresh like a new car, after years of waiting, Capcom decided to finally release their newest addition to the Street Fighter franchise.


Now, while I'll be the first to admit I'm a huge fan of these games, thats not to say that any game like this is without its downsides.

Utilizing their same fighting system for what seems the past decade, Capcom decided to keep the basics, and only perform the most simple of tweeks to it. IE: Polishing the response time, adding in a new Focus Attack function, and minimalistic things such as that. However, this is not to say the system is without its flaws.

The Xbox 360 version (Box art shown above), seems to have plenty of them. The combo chains.. They make you want to throw your controller at the TV, as some of them you can pull off, however the system will say, "Please do this and this and that and this to perform this combo!", blissfully unaware you've just done that. It's like playing a 60$ version of Simon Says. This does not make for good playing.

The next glaring flaw is the lack of replay value. Sure, you can kick the ever loving snot out of your friends and loved ones for days on end, but it gets old. Really old. Really fast. The bliss from waffle-stomping everyone on the street can only last for so long, before the game is retired to your shelf, and never touched again.

Ever.

You have a total of twenty five playable characters, including a boss character that's Dhalsim-Guile-Ryu-Zangief-The Maytag Man all rolled into one. Not to mention after lord knows how many years, Capcom finally decided to play into EGM's old joke of Shenlong, this time by creating a character named Gouken, who is the master of Ryu and Ken, whom you can unlock by pretty much the same scenerio as the original April Fools joke said. (Which by the by, this character is just as, if not cheaper then Akuma/Gouki.. Says a lot, don't it?)

The lack of additional stages, and the ability to choose character music for some stages is a bit of an annoyance, but the visual designs more then make up for it. The character models are beautiful, and have their own appeal (Especially Dan, whose become a Mentos spokesman since his last appearance in the series.)

Personally, I like how smooth it feels. I grew up with Street Fighter II: Championship Edition on the SNES. So using the D-Pad on my 360 controller isn't any different then from those days. It seems though, that to get the most of the game you need to have an Arcade Stick.

The second big bonus to me is the animated cut-scenes, which gives the game more then your standard arcade brawler feel. Another bonus, and the last one for me, is the language options. The ability to choose English or Japanese Voices for the characters? And then set whichever character you want to have either of the two? That's a big bonus. More games should do that in my opinion.

Capcom has also announced that if the desire is there, there would be downloadable characters for the game, maybe even stages. But that still doesn't justify the price tag. Nor does it justify what we're getting now.

Final thoughts? All in all, while I may still end up purchasing this game? I'm still glad in the end I rented it first.
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My thoughts on Fallout 3 
Sunday, March 1, 2009, 11:40 PM - Xbox
Posted by fujikoma3x222
If sneaking across an irradiated wasteland in the hopes of getting a sneak attack critical on random mutated beasts, raiders, Talon Company Mercenaries, Enclave soldiers and super-mutants sounds like fun to you, buy this game now. I certainly enjoyed it, but as my friend Jason pointed out to me, some people just want to shoot things, and don't want to be bothered with exploring for hours and hours on end. If that sounds like you, you might seriously feel like you are wasting your time.

I'm a bit of a long-term strategy junkie, what sucks is that it doesn't spill over into my everyday life as well as it should, especially when I spend months glued to a game like this. Perhaps the most infuriating (if somewhat realistic) thing I've found is that if I try to arm and deploy all of my bottlecap, plasma and frag mines (which I've been stockpiling since the start of the game) into a giant mound in the hopes of firing a mini-nuke into it, I discovered that it explodes once the stack size and weight distribution becomes unstable, while I'm stacking the mines! Big time! My headphones almost blew my head off with what sounded like a crazed, colossal jaguar screaming into my face.

I have most of my fun roaming the wastes with a simple hunting rifle. It is a very versatile, cheap and aesthetically pleasing weapon, even if the magazine only holds 5 rounds. You're ready for just about anything but Mr. Gutsys, sentry bots, Deathclaws and that dude at the bottom of Fort Bannister, which you should carry pulse grenades and a dart gun for. Stay light, stay undetected.

Granted, you certainly won't be safe, which is why it's important to pick every lock you can, hack every terminal you find, take most of the speech tests you encounter, and generally convert the wastes to a lifeless field of diverse corpses in the hopes of attaining enough experience points to boost the skills and perks you need to survive. The bad news is: the enemies get stronger as you level up. The good news is that if you play your cards right, you end up with the better hand.
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Afro Samurai- Second impression 
Sunday, March 1, 2009, 11:36 PM - Xbox
Posted by fujikoma3x222
Once you begin to mesh and identify with the strange sort of world that Afro Samurai inhabits, you begin to appreciate the way the music goes with the visuals, among other things.

The controls aren't so bad, once you get to a high enough experience level you begin to get some wild combos and begin to understand the methods of making them work in the midst of a seemingly endless stream of bad dudes... And learning when to use over-focus to hack and slash mobs to pieces in a dashing whirlwind of madness.

There are interesting diversions along the way... The most important being to find the hidden clusters of crows in order to unlock the "Father's Legacy" moves and combos, which I never found useful, the most fun being "body part poker", in which you get a card for each head or limb that you chop off, the suit of which is determined by the enemy type for a maximum of three cards (I was quite happy with my Ninja Straight Flush, which unlocked the "No Limit Ninjas" achievement which is funny, think about it), and the most irritating being getting lost in the tower inhabited by the Empty Seven, which some of you more masochistic individuals might enjoy.

Perhaps what I like most is the environment, it really lends an element of beauty to what would otherwise be a sort of nasty bloodbath interspersed with evil three dimensional platform mazes (at first rather simple, but probably not as complicated as some other games of the same kind, I really don't have a lot of experience with these kinds of games) that involve paying attention and slightly maddening tests of reflexes and timing.

The environments, game-play, story and soundtrack come together nicely enough to outshine the awkwardness I felt playing it at first, which means I think it's worth renting at least (It was too short to advocate buying, though some of you might find some replay value in there somewhere). My one REAL bitch is that I think they should have attached a two-player death-match mode attached to the game, but perhaps they could be convinced to consider it.

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Afro Samurai- first impression 
Saturday, February 28, 2009, 08:21 PM - Xbox
Posted by fujikoma3x222
The intro cinematic scene caught my interest, but what followed after beginning a new game could best be described as awkward and too linear. Luckily by chapter 3 the stage design became more diverse and I actually stood a chance of blundering off a cliff somewhere, if only for brief periods of time. One thing I don't like about the way the battles are set up, strange barriers often prevent you from using your environment to its full potential. Speaking of the battle system, I am reminded of the newer ninja gaiden games, only without weapon diversity or upgrades. The only upgrades you get are from leveling up, and I don't believe your attacks actually get stronger from leveling, although it's hard to tell, as you aren't exactly greeted with specifics as to your gains when you achieve a new level.

I didn't encounter much of a challenge in battle until chapter 3, and then only during the boss battle... Once you get used to the rythm of the attacks, though, countering with a parry becomes easy, although the same could be said of any game. Still, by chapter 5 I am only mildly amused, and I wish I could smoke a fat bowl, which would probably render the game much deeper and profound, but sober I can only enjoy the game so much.

The music is ok, although at some points I'm like "Wow, that's really wicked!". Sometimes, though, the carpet clashes with the drapes (as far as the music is concerned). I understand it was based off of an animation, which likely renders it vulnerable to accidental sabotage from licensing agreements and deadlines (E.T., anyone?), but considering I think I'd seen adds years ago for the animation, I somehow doubt that was much of a problem.

The sound is alright, except for that part in chapter three where the Sword Master (Well duh, that's his name, not title... lol) starts the chapter with this old, gravelly voice, but once the action starts he sounds like a large black man with a severe case of roid rage. This was highly amusing, I just wish they'd made his appearance match his voice and scrapped the old man voice at the beginning (though I could have imagined the whole voice change thing).

The story is rather interesting, and I like the environments, but most of the characters are hard to get attached to, as most of them are either stone cold killers or die shortly after their introduction, Ninja Ninja is just a big shit-talker who hides when the violence starts, and Afro himself doesn't speak much... Hey, it costs big bucks to purchase Samuel L. Jackson's voice, although the stoic, silent type of main character does fit the story, and may or may not have been the character in the animation.

The controls are not good, but not terrible. To dash you have to push the left control stick in... Do I need to tell you how annoying it is to try and control a running character while pushing the control stick in?! It should have been LB or RB. The controls in Focus Mode (Which slows down time and allows you to perform perfect slices, as long as you aim them right and time them right, as well as deflect and split bullets) are hard to grasp, as you get so little focus time, and it takes a number of combos to build your focus back up, which isn't indicated by a gauge, but by the brightness of the tassle hanging from your sword.

I haven't gotten too far into the game, I'm guessing, but so far it leaves a lot to be desired, but certainly surprised me in certain areas, and like many games, will probably make up for its more awkward moments as I progress in the game.

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