Little Big Planet - Day 4
Only now is LBP starting to lose some of its awe and wonder on me, and what's left is still a very worthwhile game--particularly as a creative outlet or a party experience. Sunny has finally warmed up to online play and asked me to set up a keyboard for the PS3 (it's not much of a setup, really: plug in pretty much any USB keyboard and it'll work auto-magically).
An important detail that I forgot to mention about the God of War level in my last post is that it involves some gratuitous violence. At one point a prisoner begs you not to kill him, but you can't progress past that point in the level until you've dragged his cage over to an open, flaming pit and dropped him to a gorey doom. This gruesome endeavor is made all the more absurd by the cutesy general atmosphere of LBP, which does not let up even in such situations.
The viral nature of LBP became clear to me when Sunny grouped up with a random goof online this evening, and they proceeded to share entries from each other's "Hearted" (favorites) lists of online levels. Sure enough, Sunny had the other player running through the God of War themed level with her.
In other news, I was playing WoW last night, trying to get the Anti-Undead armor sets for the Scourge Invasion event. All in all I took out six rare mobs and, being alone, collected all six drops of the pants. Two of them were plate, two were leather, and two were mail. Needless to say, as a Priest, I was frustrated by this turn of events. I want that gear for grinding Argent Dawn rep in Stratholme and Scholomance.
Video Games Live, LBP Day 2
The Video Games Live concert last night was excellent--better than I expected, even. One thing that I wasn't prepared for was the PAX-like atmosphere of the event; it was crowded with the same kind of gamer mentality. In hindsight I should have expected that, but I was anticipating a more typical concert experience. Sunny and I were glad that we went.
Now that the Little Big Planet servers are back online, Sunny and I got to experience some of the community content. One particularly impressive level was a God of War themed one that Sunny played. It was so high quality that it could have been a level that shipped with the game, and there's no way that somebody created that since LBP's release unless they were in the beta or they're somehow professionally involved with LBP.
Sunny found online play to be too high latency for her taste, and I don't know if the bottleneck is more on the server side or if it's my wireless network at home that's the culprit. Sunny has obviously been spoiled by the high quality online experience of WoW. :)
I did find that downloading levels goes quickly, and it's nice that when one gets stuck in the single player Story mode (which is likely to happen), one can jump online and explore the user submitted content.
On a different note, I've been reading a bit about Fallout 3 and have decided that I need to pick up a copy at some point, however I'm pretty swamped with other stuff so that might not be anytime soon. I haven't decided yet whether it will be an Xbox 360 copy or a PC copy, but I'm leaning towards PC--perhaps even Steam. Speaking of Steam, I've already pre-ordered Left 4 Dead and I've been tempted to order Empire Total War. Steam is hotter than usual lately.
Little Big Planet - Day 1
Finally picked up LBP yesterday. Sunny and I started playing around 7 pm, had a short break for dinner, and played pretty much until midnight. I went to bed. Slept in, found out Sunny had pulled an all-nighter to play more LBP. She was still playing when I left for work.
We couldn't connect to the LBP online servers last night; I assume that the heavy traffic is causing or exposing technical difficulties on their end. We also toyed around briefly with the tools for creating levels, but we were mostly too impatient to stick with it and do much. The level-building experience so far has been very reminiscent of Gary's Mod: it's very easy to do hilarious things, but requires practice and patience to create something of lasting appeal.
LBP so far has reminded me of just how dormant the "platformer" genre has been. It is fully worthy of the legacy left by classics like Mario Bros., Sonic, and Wonder Boy. You've probably heard ad-nauseum by now about how fantastic the multiplayer experience with LBP is, if not experienced it first-hand, but I'll reiterate it here: Sunny and I had many moments of laugh-out-loud comedy, reverant wonder, and edge-of-your-seat drama while playing LBP last night. The experience provided by LBP is right up there with Portal; it is a perfect game.
Video Games Live is playing a concert in Vancouver tonight, and Sunny and I have tickets. We'll probably manage to squeeze in some more LBP as well; it's the first video game in what seems like ages that we've been able to play together apart from Castle Crashers and the ever-present World of WarCraft.
Brief Mash-Up on Motorsports Games
Over the last year I've played a bunch of different motorsports games varying in their level of sim or arcade style. Not all of them have received much attention (and the level of attention has varied wildly between them) but I have played at least enough to form impressions on the following titles:
- Gran Turismo 5: Prologue (PlayStation 3)
- Forza 2 (Xbox 360)
- PGR3 (Xbox 360)
- Need for Speed: Most Wanted (Xbox 360)
- Race Driver: Grid (PlayStation 3)
- MotoGP '07 (Xbox 360)
- Ridge Racer 6 (Xbox 360)
Without further ado, I'll give a quick n' dirty review of each title. It's worth noting that I got most of these games either used or on sale, and I make note of two games (PGR3 and MotoGP '07) that were especially cheap.
Gran Turismo 5: PrologueGT5:P is, as its predecessors, pristine. While GT5:P lacks the abundance of cars and tracks that GT4 has, there is a great deal of depth to what is there. Each car has a distinctive feel--a personality, even--that comes across in the game. The lack of damage modeling is considered by some to be a good thing. There's a lot of challenge to be had here, but the challenge curve isn't very flexible which makes the game daunting to casual gamers. Overall, an excellent game.
Forza 2Forza 2 doesn't have the best graphics, but it does have a potent combination of rich gameplay, a vast career mode, and satisfying car customization options. I've found Forza 2 to be among the most addictive racing games that I've ever played. One of its best features is the ability to tweak driver assists in order to customize the gameplay experience to suit one's skill level (now a common feature in racing games, it seems). Another excellent game.
PGR3I bought this game used for under $10. It's a good deal at that price, and casual gamers who are looking for a more arcade-y experience may prefer this game to more serious racing sims, but in the end I found that it didn't do enough to satisfy my hunger for a challenging racing experience. PGR3 isn't entirely without depth or merit, though; I would say it's a fair game.
Need for Speed: Most WantedThis is the most arcade-style title on the list (oops, I forgot about Ridge Racer 6), and completely lacks any sim elements to its gameplay. As an action title, it holds up very well, especially considering that it's now several years old. Graphics and gameplay have moved along, but NFS:MW is still fun to play.
Race Driver: GridGrid is an impressive game that mixes up sim elements with action racing. The gameplay is customizable in a manner similar to Forza 2, but I've found that the difficulty level of Grid varies chaotically between events, with some events being too easy and others being too difficult with the same settings. Grid doesn't offer a lot of cars, but what it does offer is a variety of event types (including racing modes such as Drift and Destruction Derby), a great cockpit view, and spectacular crashes. Grid also offers the Prince of Persia 3D alike ability to rewind time using instant replay and then restart the race at some point in the recent past up to a limited number of times per race. Overall, Grid is challenging and novel.
MotoGP '07MotoGP '07 is another game that I picked up on the cheap ($10) and is marginally worth the cost. It has sparse graphics and reasonable gameplay, which makes it worthwhile simply to throw motorcycle racing into the mix (I wonder how PGR4 holds up), but I haven't enjoyed it as much as Tourist Trophy. The controls are tricky and the race courses are demanding, so this isn't one for casual gamers.
Ridge Racer 6Ridge Racer is what I like to call a "combo racer" since the series is extremely arcade-y, to the point where the controls only barely resemble driving. Seriously, Ridge Racer 6 has more in common with Soul Calibur 4 than it does with other driving games. With that in mind, the game isn't too shabby, although it's nothing special either. If you're expecting a real racing game, you're likely to be bitterly disappointed. If you're expecting a Namco game, you may find this to be worth your time, although I wouldn't count on that either.
Geometry Wars 2 Scores
I just noticed that over on mygamercard.net, you can generate a scorecard for Geometry Wars 2:
