#351 Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II

Posted: 28th June 2015 by Jeroen in Games
Tags: , , ,
1

436th played so far

JediKnight-cover

Genre: First-Person Shooter
Platform: PC
Year of Release: 1997
Developer: LucasArts
Publisher: LucasArts

 An FPS set in the Star Wars universe? The two seem made for each other. Let’s just do this.

Our Thoughts

While it often makes sense to unlock your powers one step at a time, giving you a chance to get used to them, build you up as more and more powerful and usually fitting into the story. It’s a bit of a problem for the blog, as we can often miss out on content. We try to get far enough into a game to experience them enough and get a good feel for them, something we certainly did playing through the Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic series.

Sometimes we don’t find about them until afterwards – I’m sure we’ve missed out on features of games that would have contributed to the write up. More notably, however, are games like Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II. A lot of the game revolves around you being a jedi (obviously), but that requires you to past to the third level (of 21). Force powers seem to come in at a similar rate.

That would be fine normally, surely, with a normal difficulty curve getting there should be possible without worrying too much about having to redo it. Sure, you might fall back a few times as needed, but not hopeless yet. Today, however, it wasn’t that easy. Dying three minutes in, the time we took to just get through the first level kept going up, until eventually the game left us in a spot where we didn’t have the health to continue facing the enemies it threw at us. The game isn’t necessarily stingy with it… it just enjoys overwhelming you while you don’t always have the weapons you need to handle it.

Multiplayer made these powers a lot more accessible – you start with them and get to pick which ones you can use. It shows more clearly how the game is meant to use these powers. None of them are major ones, overwhelming play, instead they add some boosts to make play a bit more… awesome, really.

As a shooter, though, the game works well, with the Star Wars universe being a good fit. It starts out on a space station, which looks as you’d expect, but the Star Wars aesthetic seems to show through, and both the enemies and random NPCs (droid and people repeating a single line) make the game feel like it belongs to the universe.

Final Thoughts

To me, it feels like Star Wars is a bit of a jump in and gun universe, where you should be avoiding blaster shots while shooting wildly. This game doesn’t seem to reward that as much though, instead being just a tad too stingy and a bit too strict. It’s partially experience too though – this generation of shooters is more awkward than I’m used to – but I’m just not sure how much of this is intent or based on time. Good, but slightly too disappointing.

#28 Venture

Posted: 24th June 2015 by Jeroen in Games
Tags: , , ,
0

435th played so far

Venture-arcade-artwork

Genre: Action
Platform: Arcade
Year of Release: 1981
Developer: Exidy
Publisher: Exidy

Time for a short diversion to another early game. Venture isn’t the first dungeon crawler we covered – Eamon, Rogue and Adventure came before, as did arguably Zork and MUD. Venture, however, is the first arcade one on the list, and so will have a different focus.

Our Thoughts

The differences between these games are quite remarkable. Where most of these previous games give you some time to think and expect you to think about your steps, Venture doesn’t allow much time. Enemies walk around at a decent speed and if you stay in a room for too long, giant ghosts come in and chase after you. Enemies can be shot, but you need to be quick to line up and do so – avoidance can be just as vital making it through.

What was frustrating is that the difficulty felt pitched at a level that made this pretty difficult. Finishing the first room alone is difficult – no matter what direction you go in – and with a limited number of lives you get to start from scratch fairly frequently. We didn’t have to worry about money, but if this were in an arcade I would find it truely fascinating. It doesn’t help that the game just doesn’t feel like it pays off early enough anyway.

Forcing our way through, however, shows how much the game does. There are a number of different enemy types, each with not only different attack patterns (although mostly random and featuring a lot of avoidance) but also different ways to kill them – it all comes down to shooting them, but different numbers of attacks needed and such.

The game looks pretty primitive, but despite that initial appearance the graphics work well. They’re nearly instantly recognisable and paint the right picture. The goal is obvious and the enemies are clear what they do. It’s surprisingly effective.

Final Thoughts

Venture is a good attempt at putting the dungeon crawling in an action setting. The difficulty seems a bit too high for an arcade game like this – there were times where we wouldn’t have gotten anything done in a single play. When we got far enough in that got more interesting, but until then it can get pretty repetitive to try to get past the same set of skeletons each time.

#514 No One Lives Forever 2: A Spy in H.A.R.M.’s Way

Posted: 20th June 2015 by Jeroen in Games
Tags: , , , ,
1

434th played so far

20121020001611!No_One_Lives_Forever_2_cover

Genre: First-Person Shooter
Platform: PC
Year of Release: 2002
Developer: Monolith Productions
Publisher: Sierra Entertainment

Spy movies can make for good games, especially with a nice bit of shooting – as we’ve seen in Goldeneye 007 before. Some shooting, but also plenty of reasons to explore, look in out of the way places and accomplish different targets from just killing everyone – something FPS games do need.

No One Lives Forever 2 promises to deliver that. Not as much James Bond (although it has been stuck in my head as being so, probably because the title could be straight from a Bond movie), but with enough overlap. It promises to be an interesting one.

Our Thoughts

This game honestly kept getting better as we played. It started off with decent graphics. What really grabbed us there, initially, is the lip sync. It can be dodgy even in today’s games, we didn’t expect much from a thirteen year old game… but it was pretty much perfect. Absolutely impressive. Further throughout the levels, you can tell there are graphical limitations, especially with decorative objects, but mostly the game does well in making the environments recognisable and looking good, helped by some pretty good lighting.

Clicking through, we find some more RPG-ish elements. A simple inventory system as well as character stats covering some major spy abilities – technical abilities (hacking and such), stealth, shooting and so on. It’s not very complicated – mostly an important way to encourage you to complete sidequests and try different paths. The boosts you get do feel significant enough to help make the game easier and allow you to face tougher enemies.

More on that in a moment, however, as combat doesn’t come that early. No, the next moment of awesome comes as you walk a bit further. A bird starts talking to you – a mechanical bird, as you discover moments later. It’s one of your mentors giving you advice is a less conspicuous manner, useful in these early levels. It fits in so well with the aesthetic, the spy world, that it sets the tone in the right way.

The bird also introduces you to the side quests in the game. As expected, the game sets you goals to follow, rather than just levels to beat. Sometimes it does require you to get to the next level, but others are to find contacts or, as main goal of the first set of levels, to take a video of the big crime boss in a meeting. It requires stealth, having to be quiet to get the chance to get the information, and makes for a far more gripping story. Especially as you sneak while a single wrong step could end the mission. Side quests are fairly obvious – things like collecting envelopes or finding a cache of weapons – but make a lot of sense in the world.

Combat, then is as engaging. It’s not entirely optional, but sneaking can make for easy kills (or getting people subconcious) and you’ll spend a lot of time dragging bodies away so they can’t be discovered. The AI is pretty smart too, finding you with the smallest hints sometimes, without ever being unfair – intelligent enough to be fun. There is a breadth of options – plenty of weapons, but also devices like smoke bombs and tasers to get rid of enemies. Then there are the melee weapons – the first level takes place in Japan, so of course there is a katana to be had, and used.

The game quickly moves to colder territories, which leads to one of the last features I’ll mention as being great. Sure, there are plenty of games with vehicles out there, but somehow the snowscooter feels like they are a bit special in an FPS. There’s some pure glee in racing around the world doing that, even if the path can be fairly linear, and the fact that you must make a few jumps to get through just feels right.

Final Thoughts

This game felt like it would be good, but not as exceptional as it turned out to be. Not as much a Goldeneye expansion, it more takes from the Deus Ex hymnbook (a game we’ll be playing soon that I’m greatly and badly looking forward to) and expands on it to be a bit friendlier and shootier, but makes it work just as well.

Not often does an FPS make me want to play this much more than before.  A genuinely fun discovery for us.

#479 Serious Sam

Posted: 16th June 2015 by Jeroen in Games
Tags: , , , , ,
1

433rd played so far

Serious_Sam_-_The_First_Encounter_-_US_Windows_box_art_-_Croteam

Genre: First-Person Shooter
Platform: PC
Year of Release: 2001
Developer: Croteam
Publisher: Gathering of Developers/Gotham Games

Time to play a few first-person shooters! We’ve been falling behind a bit and it’s time we play some more. It’s odd that we are – we generally find them enjoy (even if not always our first choice of game), so it’s mostly just because other games distracted us.

I sort-of experienced Serious Sam some time ago, recommended by some friends. It was good fun then, but it didn’t make as much of a lasting impression. Now, however, I get to play it again – see what was so good about the game, exactly.

Our Thoughts

As an FPS, Serious Sam seems to hit a lot of familiar notes – run around a world, fight off enemies and do some mild exploration to find some secrets to make fighting a tad easier. It’s pretty good at doing that and is very entertaining.

One thing it seems to be more than most are hordes. Large groups of enemies storm you from time to time – weak ones you kill with a hit or two – forcing complete chaos for a bit. As some enemies explode when they die, you can get good domino effects going that make them easier, but can kill you if it happens too nearby. It feels a lot more dynamic than other games, where it seems like enemies are just waiting for you – through some clever scripting you really feel like the world is moving around you.

That shows beyond these waves of attack as well. In an early level, you end up in front of a closed door. While you stand there, some flunkies run past as a boulder chases them and a bit of the Indiana Jones theme plays. It’s a nice reference that indicates how the game generally treats its world.

The story has this too. The basics are played pretty straight, a time travel story where aliens invade during the time the Egyptian pyramids were built, but the surroundings have the lighter touches. Your character is mostly the source of this – the superior fighter who has seen it all – quipping throughout – while mission briefings and logs are more serious. It’s a bit of an odd mix, but mostly creates the atmosphere, saying “We know it’s ridiculous, but it makes for interesting surroundings.”

It is as well, being set (for the first chapter) in Egyptian temples. There’s a bit of texture repetition – some corridors can look alike – but mostly the architecture is interesting enough and allows for some nice set pieces, with statues and special rooms around to complement your fighting.

Final Thoughts

Serious Sam is a well-made game. The scripts and levels seem pretty well worked out with some very good level design. It’s entertaining in places, but without hitting you over the head with it, and the serious sides make for an interesting story that help give a reason to move forward.

The designs of monsters and levels fit well, a mix of Egyptian and alien weirdness. Just loads of fun.

#70 Elite

Posted: 12th June 2015 by Jeroen in Games
Tags: , , , , , ,
2

432nd played so far

Elite2

Genre: Strategy/Shoot Em Up
Platform: Various
Year of Release: 1984
Developer: David Braben and Ian Bell
Publisher: Acornsoft

This isn’t actually the first time Elite has popped up for us to play on the blog – we tried to do so before, but got stuck and felt we needed a manual. After that, we just didn’t get back to it until now.

Elite is a space travel game, featuring battle, trade and more elements. It’s also a game people used to love – a recent-ish Kickstarter campaign proved as much. And we have to get into it now.

Our Thoughts

This early in history, it feels odd to find more in-depth games – the arcade games we see in the list more often focus on simple mechanics, but home computers and mainframes, where having to eat up coins isn’t an issue, can afford to get more complicated mechanics in where players can be expected to learn.

Elite certainly does so. You begin the game docked to (or in) a space station. Undocking happens at the push of a button, but after that you immediately fly right at the planet the space station is orbiting, requiring a quick response to get out of the way. From there on, your options are wide open and you can do what you want. The immediately visible option is to start trading between planets, moving goods around to make more money and allowing you to get bigger ships and equipment.

There are other shortcuts, of course. Asteroid mining is an option when you have the equipment, piracy is available more quickly but, considering the protection available, a challenge as well. Other options are available too.

It feels massive, with the scary thing that initially, most of these things don’t feel worth bothering with. To do several things, you must dock with a space station. You have to do this manually, requiring some slow, careful maneuvering to hit just the right spot. Oddly enough, only once you master that does it feel like you can proceed.

As impressive is the size of the world. The galaxy consists of hundreds of stars, each with their own races living on it with their own desires and options. Then there’s the option to jump between galaxies, at a high cost, expanding the size of the world. Some of it feels like showing off, indicating that they can do this much, but it gives you the feeling you can find your own little corner nobody else has found.

Probably the biggest hurdle to playing the game is the accessibility. You need to learn plenty of keys that aren’t explained, and need to discover all your options by playing. The game just doesn’t tell you anything or hold your hand – the hand holding is more often given when you have the money, such as the aforementioned docking (sorry, it’s a big part of the game). The graphics are abstract – mostly advanced vector graphics, which look good and add to the style, but don’t give as many hints.

Final Thoughts

This is a game that feels inaccessible now because of our own expectations. A lot is possible in the game though, and with the two sequels we’re going to play for the game, I hope that barrier can be taken away to provide more access to what feels like a potentially engrossing game.

#209 Star Trek: 25th Anniversary

Posted: 8th June 2015 by Jeroen in Games
Tags: , , , ,
0

431st played so far

Star_Trek_-_25th_Anniversary_Cover_der_PC_Version

Genre: Action/Adventure
Platform: PC
Year of Release: 1991
Developer: Interplay
Publisher: Interplay

The Star Trek TV series is a surprising resilient science fiction series – between tv series, movies and recent revivals it has been around for 49 years now (at the time of writing).

And as beloved as it is by geeks, one of the first video games (not listed, sadly) was indeed Star Trek-themed – the simply named Star Trek. Spread through listings in magazines, the game predates video game licensing and pitted you against Klingons in a turn based exploration game.

Today’s game is officially licensed, and the only Star Trek games on the list (unlike the multitude of Star Wars games we’ll be playing). A mix of adventure and a space shooter, I’ve been looking forward to trying this for quite some time.

Our Thoughts

When you’re a fan of a franchise, trying a new entry in it – a different medium or approach – can be daunting. It can be a cash-in, making money off a brand without caring much about quality, or it can be genuinely good and well. The former has certainly happened with Star Trek, but luckily this time, it worked out.

The game’s scenarios provide a bit of both. The space battles feel a bit more optional – I believe a few scenarios skip them. We’ll see more of it soon on Elite, but mostly the system is fairly straightforward. Most frustrating is finding your opponent – you move fairly sluggishly and the radar tries to project a 3D space onto a 2D grid, making it tricky to figure out the system.

In the end though, they felt like the more boring bit, adding some action to the game and (through attacks when you visit the wrong system) forcing you to stay on the path. The really fun parts of the game were the adventure segments. They follow the typical Star Trek formula – a landing party is gathered, you beam down and explore the scene. This is usually with the expected people – Kirk, Spock and Bones are commonly there, together with the nearly obligatory redshirt. You explore and try to solve whatever problems are ahead.

Somewhat different from other adventure games, there are a lot of optional steps you can take when resolving the missions. Some of them are just there for background material, but you also get graded on how well you do – how close do you stick to the show’s ethos, what injuries occur and what else happens. Although the show’s cast needs to survive, your redshirts can get shot, at a point penalty, adding more of a challenge when you try to get it right.

These sequences use voice acting by the original actors, which adds to the atmosphere. Beyond that, the graphics aren’t as great, but they’re good for the day and convey all the concepts very well. 3D models or more realistic graphics would probably not have worked, especially for the atmosphere the game is trying to convey.

Final Thoughts

The adventure parts of the game are a lot of fun, with the space battles being more of a frustrating exercise without a lot of practice – they’re too much of an interruption of the really good bits. As silly as it sounds, the focus on diplomacy and problem solving makes the game feel more like the tv show than any other Star Trek game I’ve played. That’s probably the best thing for a game like this – it seems to simply be the right thing.

#461 Final Fantasy X

Posted: 4th June 2015 by Jeroen in Games
Tags: , , ,
2

430th played so far

download

Genre: Role-Playing
Platform: Playstation 2
Year of Release: 2001
Developer: Square
Publisher: Square

It feels wrong to write this. Final Fantasy X is one of Peter’s favourite games – the reason we’re playing this is in part because he got the HD remake for Christmas – and I’m not sure I should be saying anything about this.

We’ve covered the series before and seen between VII, VIII, IX and XII that they can be quite different – from classic fantasy to games more resembling magic science fiction. I’m not sure yet where the tenth main installment falls, we’ll see where it leads us

Our Thoughts

One thing is clear from the start of the game – it’s trying to be different in its setting. First, a sizeable part of the cast seems obsessed with blitzball, a vaguely described ballgame that seems to (at least partially) take place in a giant sphere of water. Second, the game starts you off (properly, after a prologue) on a tropical island and guides you past several of these, together with a tribal/shamanic tradition that dominates their temples. Some of the environments are different down the line, but the colourful graphics and tropical views are amazing to look at and give the game a different (but welcoming) feel. The game feels – and maybe even plays – more relaxed than others in the series. Even the plot doesn’t seem as urgent, as you only try to find out what happened to you.

The characters are as compelling. Their motivations mean they don’t feel as driven as some other protagonists, but they’re more relatable. There’s some mopiness, but not as much as JRPGs sometimes seem to have. The story itself seems like it will still be epic, but to truly find out we’d need more time than we can dedicate.

The game looks beautiful as well. True, especially so in the HD remake, but even the glimpses of the original shows that there’s a lovely style.  The choice of environments helps, giving a chance for nicer vistas. If nothing else, the game clearly wanted to take advantage of the increased capabilities of the PS2.

The voice acting is a bit more dubious. While quite a bit of it is fine, some good, some lines come across as incredibly awkward or weak. The sound and music beyond them are good, although as a whole the audio does feel a bit like the weak part of the experience.

Final Thoughts

Going into a game loved by one of us always runs the risk of the other being disappointed. That wasn’t the case here, luckily, and I would argue it felt like the best 3D Final Fantasy game we played for the blog. It’s gone on my to-play(-further) list, so hopefully I’ll get to see what else is really going on soon.

#27 Stargate

Posted: 31st May 2015 by Jeroen in Games
Tags: , , , ,
0

429th played so far

15666-45689

Genre: Shoot Em Up
Platform: Arcade
Year of Release: 1981
Developer: Vid Kidz
Publisher: Williams Electronics

Sorry, this is not a game based on the now defunct science fiction series Stargate, its predecessor movie or its spin-offs – as our searches reminded us of when we looked the game up every once in a while. In fact, it predates the start of that franchise by thirteen years.

What we have instead is another shooter, with another ‘defend your world’ narrative. Nothing too notable at this point.

Our Thoughts

It’s sequel time again. Reading up on it further, Stargate was a sequel to Defender, another “kill the invading aliens” around the world flyer. Most of it stays the same, although there is clearly a greater and more interesting variety of enemies and options.

Probably the biggest change, however, comes from a new gameplay feature with greater strategic impact – although partially of the “would it help” variety. A few times per round you can, by pressing a button, warp to the other side of the planet (or at least somewhere on the loop). For a large part, it makes for an interesting decision especially when you’re feeling overwhelmed – when you escape it can set you free, but it can also land you in a worse position.

Beyond that, it’s a competent shooter of its type, with nothing jumping out as being done wrong, but the game often not offering as much of a change of pace. Call it us being jaded though – the arcade experience must have felt quite different at the time.

Final Thoughts

That said it all really. Stargate is a competently made shooter of its type. The few added mechanics work nicely and the changes in enemies make for a more interesting challenge. Mostly, though, it’s a game that just is there.

#529 Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos

Posted: 27th May 2015 by Jeroen in Games
Tags: , , ,
1

428th played so far

WarcraftIII

Genre: Strategy
Platform: PC
Year of Release: 2002
Developer: Blizzard Entertainment
Publisher: Blizzard Entertainment

There are so many games that allow you to be Blizzard fans, with at least three related (and often mixed) audiences. Diablo gives the more singleplayer RPG fans a go, while World of Warcraft is the MMORPG juggernaut everyone knows. (Recently they released their cardgame Hearthstone as well, which seems succesful at the time of writing, but we’ll see how that goes).

As you may remember from Warcraft II and Starcraft, however, my own preferences lean more towards their RTS games. Warcraft III is, sadly, the last we’ll discuss, but I know I’m planning on revisiting them further soon anyway.

Our Thoughts

It’s hard to see where to start with the improvements in this game. Graphics and everything aside, the one part that charms me the most is the storytelling. The game has four armies, one more than Starcraft, and follows that game’s pattern of a story per army, which you play through in order – in this case, humans, undead, orcs and night elves in that order.

 What really makes it interesting is how the story is integrated in the story. There are no briefings at the start of a mission, as we saw before, the game instead relying on in-engine scenes before, during and after every mission. A few in-engine interludes happen in locations where you can’t play, but both static heads talking (as in Starcraft) and CGI clips (like Command & Conquer‘s live action briefings) are kept to a minimum. This makes you feel far more part of the story.

Another section that contributes to it is that the heroes play a bigger part. Starcraft already had its hero units, but they just had a different colour and possibly full upgrades, but not much more. In Warcraft III, they are their own unit type, with abilities that you level up as the story progresses (approximately one level per story mission) and an inventory that carries over. Rumour has it that they were going for even more of an RPG setup in the original design, which was toned down in favour of the more familiar RTS elements. These elements remain, however, and help you get into the story more than before. In multiplayer they’re replaced with more generic versions with otherwise the same abilities, which means the system still carries over.

The gameplay nicely builds on its predecessors to bring in more improvements. From the RPG style, there are now more random smaller critters dotted around the map to help you level up and gain additional items. There are shops and mercenary camps to hire help. The range of objectives seem to be broadened, allowing for more creative use than just “kill the enemy”. This is similar to what they did in Starcraft, but it seems to have been expanded here.

With that said, another reward for the game is simply advancing. The environments change, and while elements of it are certainly dated, the graphics style hasn’t aged as badly (as discussed in its MMO version). The differences and occasional treats are nice enough, however, that I never really tire of them.

Final Thoughts

Sure, that was pretty gushing. At some level, Warcraft III has been one of the best strategy games I’ve played – a pinnacle of Blizzard’s abilities. It’s a good fantasy world – generic in places, but with enough of a backstory to stay fun – with a design that feels like it’s pushing ahead far enough to remain interesting. I’m looking forward to see how future strategy games challenge this.

#219 Desert Strike: Return to the Gulf

Posted: 23rd May 2015 by Jeroen in Games
Tags: , , ,
2

427th played so far

Desert_Strike_-_Return_to_the_Gulf_Coverart

Genre: Shoot Em Up
Platform: Various
Year of Release: 1992
Developer: Electronic Arts
Publisher: Electronic Arts

The weirdness of playing these games is how it shows our gaming options have changed over the years. Shoot Em Ups now feel like they take some effort – they don’t usually hit the right pleasure centers of my brain and it feels like it can take too much effort to just learn attack patterns.

Twenty years ago though, I had less games available to me, and shoot em ups were a large part of that group – they are incredibly common in the earlier years of the list too. I enjoyed them – and the relative variety they offered, from the static screens of Space Invaders to the side scrolling of games like Gradius and the open nature of today’s game, Desert Strike: Return to the Gulf. There was something interesting about developers exploring the limits of the genre, but just as much, it showed how we were happy with less details and more focus on the core elements.

Our Thoughts

To be honest, Desert Strike sounds almost more like an adventure when compared to those titles. While shooting and killing enemies is still a big part of the game, your goal is to rescue stranded soldiers from a desert overrun by the bad guys – the ‘Gulf’ designation making clear where they’re intended to be from.

The game has you moving over an isometric field, allowing you to attack with three different weapons (an unlimited but weak normal gun and two stronger but limited weapons, for which you can pick up ammo elsewhere). There’s plenty to destroy and a lot of enemies in your way. The controls mostly feel fairly accurate, but the lack of UI makes it difficult to see some vital facts – such as health and, more important, what weapon you currently have selected. Fuel is also limited, again with no indicator, requiring frequent returns if you don’t find any in the field, which also limits the amount of time you have to explore.

That’s certainly one annoyance, as the world is big, without many indicators of where to rescue your fellow soldiers. This means that, unless you’ve memorized the stage (or looked it up) you’re spending a lot of time aimlessly flying around, again without much indication of where you are, retreading a lot of ground. The graphics are a bit too uniform at times, adding to this – there are landmarks, but you need to happen to find them, and the circuitous route by which you get to some of them. Similarly, finding the ship you launch from is quite difficult because of the endless sea that looks the same everywhere. It makes for more of an adventure, more of a puzzle, and works for people who wanted to invest more time in it – but as said, I feel like I’ve grown past that.

Final Thoughts

There’s a lot of things that the game does surprisingly well, and I’d argue that for the most part I really enjoyed playing it. It did, however, get clunky enough in places that it’s not a game I’d put in my own rotation. It just makes me hope that we find more games like this soon, a bit more advanced, to have it play better. I’m not really aware of any, but it feels like there must have been.

Older Entries
Newer Entries